LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA. 

Class 


PESTALOZZI 


OFTHE 

UNIVERSITY 

OF 


PESTALOZZI 


PIONEEES    IN    EDUCATION 

PESTALOZZI 

AND    ELEMENTARY    EDUCATION 

BY 

GABRIEL  COMPAYRE 

CORRESPONDENT  OF  THE  INSTITUTE  J  DIRECTOR  OF  THE  ACADEMY 

OF  LYONS;    AUTHOR  OF   ''PSYCHOLOGY  APPLIED   TO 

EDUCATION,"  "LECTURES  ON  PEDAGOGY," 

"  A  HISTORY  OF  PEDAGOGY,"  ETC. 


TRANSLATED  BY 
E.    P.   JAGO 


[f  UNIVERSITY 

OF 


NEW  YOEK 

THOMAS  Y.  CEOWELL  &  CO. 
PUBLISHEES 


COPTEIGHT,  1907, 

BY  THOMAS  T.  CEO  WELL  &  COMPANY. 


PUBLISHED,  SEPTEMBER,  1907. 


CONTENTS  AND   SUMMARY 


PREFACE vii 

I.  Pestalozzi  and  Herbart.  —  How  Pestalozzi  deserves  to  be 

studied  in  himself.  —  His  great  fame.  —  A  militant 
teacher.  —  He  can  be  defined  as  a  philanthropist  of 
education.  —  Recrudescence  of  his  renown  in  Switzer- 
land, during  these  last  years 3 

II.  Zurich  at  the  period  when  Pestalozzi  wa^  studying  there 
(1764).  —  A  hot-bed  of  literary  studies.  —  Centre  of  a 
political  and  social  movement.  —  Influence  of  Rous- 
seau's writings.  —  Pestalozzi  a  youthful  revolutionary. 

—  His  belief  in  democracy.  —  Home  training.  —  Pesta- 
lozzi the  pupil  of  his  mother.  —  Precocious  experience  of 
the  miseries  of  the  people.  —  His  marriage.  —  His  wife's 
character.  —  How  Pestalozzi  became  an  educator.  — 
Education  of  his  son  his  first  pedagogical  experience.  — 
The  Journal  d'un  pere.  —  Hesitations  between  the  prin- 
ciple of  authority  and  the  principle  of  liberty.  —  "I 
wish  only  to  be  a  schoolmaster."  .        *  .      •        •        .9 

III.  Neuhof  (1768-1780).  —  Agricultural  and  industrial  at- 
tempts. —  Why  Pestalozzi  went  to  the  country  people. 

—  Financial  ruin.  —  Establishment  of  the  refuge  for 
poor  children.  —  Association  pf  manual  labour  and  ele- 
mentary instruction.  —  A  School  of  abnormal  children. 

—  Heroic  efforts.  —  Definite  check  to  the  enterprise 
(1780) 19 

IV.  Stans.  —  Eighteen    years    of    discouragement,    from 
1780  to  1798.  —  Pestalozzi  the  writer.  — List  of  his 

iii 


165084 


iv  CONTENTS  AND  SUMMARY 

PAGE 

works.  —  The  Helvetic  Revolution.  —  The  orphanage 
at  Stans  (1798).  —  Peculiar  difficulties  of  the  work:  a 
heretic,  a  revolutionary,  is  sent  to  a  Catholic  and 
reactionary  people. — Wretched  introduction. — Pesta- 
lozzi's  moral  action.  —  His  enthusiasm  for  France.  — 
Jffpjjiojja jTinircHiftf^  and  J5S^SS«2feJ;a^??.4*  —  Wonderful 
activity.  —  Pestalozzi  exhausted  by  his  efforts.  — 
Closing  of  the  orphanage  (1799).  —  A  visit  to  Stans  in 
1901 28 

V.  Burgdorf  and  Yverdon   (1800-1825).  —  Pestalozzi,  at 

fifty-two,  assistant  teacher  in  a  school  for  children.  — 
He  receives  promotion.  —  He  becomes  superintendent 
of  the  "Burgdorf  Educational  Institute. "  —  His  first 
collaborators :  Krusi,  Buss,  and  Tobler.  —  Other  collab- 
orators. —  Special  branches  pf  teaching., —  The  Burg- 
dorf Institute  transferred  to  Munchenbuchsee  (1804),  . 
then  to  Yverdon  (1805).  —  Everything  taught.  — 
Pestalozzi  does  not,  however,  give  up  the  achievement 
of  his  "Method"  of  elementary  instruction.  —  Bril- 
liant success  of  the  Yverdon  Institute.  —  Influx  of 
visiting  strangers.  —  Pestalozzi  seeks  the  support  of 
the  chiefs  of  state.  —  His  visits  to-  the  emperor  of  Rus- 
sia and  to  the  king  of  Prussia.  — ^school  day at.  Yver- 
don. —  A  cosmopolitan  college.  ^-  Interior  troubles.  — 
Internal  dissensions.  —  Rivalry  of  Schmid  and  Nie- 
derer. — Attacks  from  without.  —  Pestalozzi's  religion. 
( —  His  philosophic  deigni.,— -  Pestalozzi  ftn{|  Rousseau 
\compared.  —  Closing  of  the  Institute  (1825).  —  Last 
days  at  Neuhof.  —  Death  of  Pestalozzi  (February  17, 
1827) 41 

VI.  The  method    and  the  practice.  —  Pestalozzi 's    uncer- 
tainties. —  His  commentators.  —  Intuition  the  starting- 
point  of  all  knowledge  and  of  all  instruction.  —  Intuition 
of  the  senses  and  moral  intuition.  —  The  "art  of  intui- 


CONTENTS  AND  SUMMARY  v 

PAGE 

tion." —  The  principle  of  gradation  and  of  concentration. 

—  Study  of  the  human  body,  first  exercise  of  intuition 
and  of  language.  —  Intensive  development  of  the  fa 
ulties  of  more  importance  than  the  extension  of  positiv^ 
knowledge.  —  The  faculties  grow  with  exerciseT^-  In-  j 
terest  in  the  study  a  necessary  condition  to  intellectual) 
progress.  —  Conversation  with  Bell.  —  Simplifying  Lof 

Jhe  Method.  —  The  Method-machine.  —  Pestalozzi's 
practice  often  at  variance  with  his  principles.  —  Abuse 
of  the  device  of  object  lessons.  —  Thejgees  and  the 
flowers.  —  Criticism  of  the  theory  "of  the  number,  the 
shape,  and  the  word."  —  T]j£ ,, BurgcLorf... tapestry  and 
language  exercises.  —  Fresh  form  of  verbiage.  — 
Drawing  studied  geometrically.  —  Ravaisson's  opinion* 

—  Intuition  in  the  study  of  geography. —  Mental  calcula- 
tion. — .Many  educators  of  the  present  day  are  Pestaloz- 
zians  without  knowing  it.  —  Reading  made  subordinate 
to  oral  exercises.  —  The  movable  letters.  —  Drawmg^ 
before    writing.  —  Arithmetic    and    geometry"  taught 
experimentally.  —  The  technical  ABC.  —  Moral  edu-, 
cation  based  on  intuition  and  experience.  —  Develop- 
ment of  the  sentiments  in  the  child.  —  Education  should 
be  continued  kindness. — The  leading  role  of  the  mother. 

—  Religious  education.  —  Pestalozzi's  work  limited  to 
elementary  education    .         .        ".        .        .        .        .63 

VII.   Pestalozzi's  influence.  —  Diesterweg  and  the  celebra- 
tion of  the  anniversary  of  his  birth  (January  12,  1846). 

—  Immediate  propagation  of  his  doctrines.  — A  gather- 
ing at  Mme.  de  StaePs.  —  His  influence  in  Germany.  — 
Fichte  and  Froebel.  —  Pestalozzian  schools  in  Berlin, 
Frankfort,   etc.  —  Pestalozzianism  in  '  Spain.  —  Come- 
nius  and  Pestalozzi.  —  Importation  of  his  methods  into 
Denmark  and  England. — The  Lettres  a  Greaves  sur  I' edu- 
cation elementaire.  —  Pestalozzian  experiments  in  Amer- 


vi  CONTENTS  AND  SUMMARY 

PAGE 

ica  and  France.  —  How  Pestalozzi  has  been  compared 
to  nearly  all  the  educational  theorists.  —  Application 
of  his  methods  by  practical  workers  .  .  .  .  100 

VIII.  The  author  and  the  man.  —  Defects  and  qualities  of 
his  writings.  —  His  defectiveness  in  the  presentation  of 
abstract  truths.  —  His  talent  as  a  narrator.  —  Leonard 
et  Gertrude  and  the  popular  novel.  —  The  ironical  note. 
—  View  of  social  policy.  —  The  right  of  property.  — 
Utopias.  —  His  estimation  of  printing  and  of  the  Protes- 
tant Reformation.  —  Burning  eloquence.  —  The  virtues 
of  the  man.  —  His  courage.  —  His  disinterestedness.  — 
His  sufferings.  — r  Mme.  Pestalozzi.  —  Hours  of  happi- 
ness. —  He  dreamed  more  than  he  accomplished.  — 
Schools  in  Pestalozzi's  time.  —  A  Swiss  educator  in 
1795.  —  The  lay  school.  —  Pestalozzi's  moral  great- 
ness   118 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 137 


PEEFACE 

IN  placing  the  name  of  Pestalozzi  after  those  of 
Rousseau  and  Spencer,  in  the  list  of  great  educators, 
we  render  rightful  tribute  to  a  man  of  heart,  a 
man  of  action,  praiseworthy  in  both,  who  is  not 
well  enough  known  in  France,  where  he  is  by  turns 
cried  down,  neglected,  or  unduly  exalted,  but  who, 
impartially  judged,  merits  one  of  the  chief  places  in 
the  golden  book  of  the  history  of  education. 

Was  it  not  of  him  that  the  English  Andrew 
Bell  —  who,  however,  did  not  appreciate  his 
methods  of  instruction  —  said :  "  He  is  a  man  of 
experience,  enthusiasm,  and  genius"  ?  Was  it  not 
him  that  the  German  Diesterweg  hailed  as  the 
"Father  of  the  public  school"? 

Pestalozzi  has  been  the  direct  descendant  of 
Rousseau.  J.-P.  Richter,  in  his  Levana,  wrote  in 
1806:  "And  still  Pestalozzi  continues  among  the 
people  the  work  of  Rousseau."  But  although  the 
author  of  Emile  has  had  only  one  descendant,  even 
an  imaginary  one,  Pestalozzi  has  brought  up  millions 
of  children ;  and  he  has  trained  the  masters  no  less 

vii 


viii  PREFACE 

than  he  has  instructed  the  pupils.  He  has  had  an 
extraordinary  influence  upon  the  education  of  his 
day,  which  has  continued  throughout  the  years  of 
the  past  century.  In  1861  the  Society  of  Teachers 
of  Berlin  did  not  hesitate  to  make  this  declaration : 
"  We  are  convinced  that  the  happy  results  of  the 
present  time  in  our  schools,  obtained  despite  the 
official  red  tape/'  —  the  famous  Code  of  1853, — 
"  are  due  in  large  measure  to  the  corps  of  teachers 
who  have  been  grounded  in  the  principles  of 
Pestalozzi." 

Pestalozzi  is  undoubtedly  the  creator  of  the  idea, 
as  well  as  the  fact,  of  the  new  school,  the  promoter 
of  modern  pedagogy.  He  has  dreamed,  he  has  de- 
sired, the  school  universal,  the  school  free  alike  to 
rich  and  poor,  just  as  the  Church  or  Temple  is  open 
to  people  of  every  condition.  And  in  order  to  bring 
about  the  accomplishment  of  his  dream,  he  has  de- 
voted, sacrificed  his  life.  He  has  laboured  only  for 
others.  He  has  spent  his  days,  to  the  weakening, 
despoiling,  and  ruining  of  both  body  and  mind, 
in  the  service  of  humanity,  of  humanity  down- 
trodden and  oppressed.  It  is  to  the  lowly  and  the 
little  ones  especially  that  he  has  dedicated  the  sen- 
timents of  his  heart  and  the  fruits  of  his  strength, 
burning  for  the  rights  and  liberty  of  the  people,  and 
for  their  honour  and  happiness. 


PREFACE  ix 

In  choosing  the  sub-title  for  this  study,  we  might 
therefore  have  well  written,  "  Pestalozzi,  and  Popu- 
lar Education."  But  it  was  not  to  the  people  alone 
that  he  addressed  himself ;  and  in  his  teaching  he 
has  not  been  concerned  merely  with  the  simple  edu- 
cation of  children,  sons  of  the  common  people,  of 
workmen,  or  of  peasants.  Similarly,  if  we  con- 
sidered one  of  the  essential  principles  of  his 
method,  it  would  not  be  incorrect  to  say,  "  Pesta- 
lozzi,  and  Intuitive  Education,"  since  he  is  the  real 
initiator  of  the  Leqons  de  Choses. 

On  the  other  hand,  if  we  had  preferred  to  define 
the  character  of  his  work  as  that  of  intuition,  to 
which  he  attached  some  importance,  it  is  after  all 
not  the  point  of  departure  for  his  system  of  teach- 
ing. We  think  that  we  have  responded  better  to 
his  ideas,  and  have  at  the  same  time  conformed  to 
his  exact  terms,  when  we  assign  as  his  especial 
domain,  "  Elementary  Education,"  that  which  fixes 
the  first  instruction  of  the  child  in  letters  and 
morals.  "  Elementary  Education  "  —  that  is  in- 
deed the  constant  goal  of  the  indefatigable  activity 
of  Pestalozzi.  He  has  not  laboured  when  he  felt 
moved  only  by  his  inspiration,  and  when  the  circum- 
stances have  imposed  upon  him  a  role  to  his  liking ; 
he  has  laboured  only  for  childhood.  He  has  excelled 
in  the  art  of  training  the  child  in  the  life  intel- 


viii  PREFACE 

than  he  has  instructed  the  pupils.  He  has  had  an 
extraordinary  influence  upon  the  education  of  his 
day,  which  has  continued  throughout  the  years  of 
the  past  century.  In  1861  the  Society  of  Teachers 
of  Berlin  did  not  hesitate  to  make  this  declaration : 
"  We  are  convinced  that  the  happy  results  of  the 
present  time  in  our  schools,  obtained  despite  the 
official  red  tape/'  —  the  famous  Code  of  1853, — 
"  are  due  in  large  measure  to  the  corps  of  teachers 
who  have  been  grounded  in  the  principles  of 
Pestalozzi." 

Pestalozzi  is  undoubtedly  the  creator  of  the  idea, 
as  well  as  the  fact,  of  the  new  school,  the  promoter 
of  modern  pedagogy.  He  has  dreamed,  he  has  de- 
sired, the  school  universal,  the  school  free  alike  to 
rich  and  poor,  just  as  the  Church  or  Temple  is  open 
to  people  of  every  condition.  And  in  order  to  bring 
about  the  accomplishment  of  his  dream,  he  has  de- 
voted, sacrificed  his  life.  He  has  laboured  only  for 
others.  He  has  spent  his  days,  to  the  weakening, 
despoiling,  and  ruining  of  both  body  and  mind, 
in  the  service  of  humanity,  of  humanity  down- 
trodden and  oppressed.  It  is  to  the  lowly  and  the 
little  ones  especially  that  he  has  dedicated  the  sen- 
timents of  his  heart  and  the  fruits  of  his  strength, 
burning  for  the  rights  and  liberty  of  the  people,  and 
for  their  honour  and  happiness. 


PREFACE  ix 

In  choosing  the  sub-title  for  this  study,  we  might 
therefore  have  well  written,  "  Pestalozzi,  and  Popu- 
lar Education/'  But  it  was  not  to  the  people  alone 
that  he  addressed  himself ;  and  in  his  teaching  he 
has  not  been  concerned  merely  with  the  simple  edu- 
cation of  children,  sons  of  the  common  people,  of 
workmen,  or  of  peasants.  Similarly,  if  we  con- 
sidered one  of  the  essential  principles  of  his 
method,  it  would  not  be  incorrect  to  say,  "  Pesta- 
lozzi,  and  Intuitive  Education,"  since  he  is  the  real 
initiator  of  the  Lemons  de  Choses. 

On  the  other  hand,  if  we  had  preferred  to  define 
the  character  of  his  work  as  that  of  intuition,  to 
which  he  attached  some  importance,  it  is  after  all 
not  the  point  of  departure  for  his  system  of  teach- 
ing. We  think  that  we  have  responded  better  to 
his  ideas,  and  have  at  the  same  time  conformed  to 
his  exact  terms,  when  we  assign  as  his  especial 
domain,  "  Elementary  Education,"  that  which  fixes 
the  first  instruction  of  the  child  in  letters  and 
morals.  u  Elementary  Education  "  —  that  is  in- 
deed the  constant  goal  of  the  indefatigable  activity 
of  Pestalozzi.  He  has  not  laboured  when  he  felt 
moved  only  by  his  inspiration,  and  when  the  circum- 
stances have  imposed  upon  him  a  role  to  his  liking ; 
he  has  laboured  only  for  childhood.  He  has  excelled 
in  the  art  of  training  the  child  in  the  life  intel- 


x  PREFACE 

lectual  and  moral.  "  That  which  takes  chief  place 
in  my  aspirations  is  the  first  impulse  of  my  youth 
for  the  people  and  for  childhood/'  he  asserted.  In 
his  last  work,  The  Swan  Song,  he  devotes  two  hun- 
dred pages  to  analyzing  the  development  of  the 
idea  of  Elementar'bildung .  In  the  discourse  which 
he  prepared,  some  time  before  his  death,  for  the 
Societe  Helvetique,  which  had  proclaimed  him  its 
president,  it  is  with  insistence  that  he  reverts  again 
to  the  fixed  idea  of  "  Elementary  Education."  >i 

His  real  glory  has  been  not  merely  in  the  inspir- 
ing of  one  class  of  the  world's  employees,  the  school- 
master ;  it  is  in  the  school  itself,  in  the  elementary 
school,  that  he  would  have  liked  to  spend  all  hisr 
life.  It  is  by  the  side  of  the  schoolhouse  that  he 
desired  to  sleep  his  last  sleep. 

"I  desire  that  they  lay  me  down  beneath  the 
eaves  of  the  school ;  that  they  write  merely  my 
name  on  the  stone  which  receives  my  ashes ;  and 
when  the  raindrops  have  partly  effaced  the  letters, 
mankind  will  deal  more  justly  with  me,  perhaps, 
than  they  have  during  my  life." 

The  appeal  which  Pestalozzi,  out  of  his  sorrows 
and  misfortunes,  addressed  to  future  generations, 
to  repair  the  injustice  of  certain  of  his  contempo- 
raries, has  been  heard.  If  his  life  was  one  of  hard- 
ship, posterity  has  dealt  kindly  with  him ;  and  it 


PREFACE  xi 

is  in  order  to  contribute  in  our  turn  to  the  grate- 
ful homage  and  admiration  due  him,  that  we  have 
written  the  following  pages  which,  though  brief, 
yet  present  the  most  complete  picture  of  the  dra- 
matic episodes  of  his  career,  of  his  heroic  life,  and 
of  his  immortal  work. 


PESTALOZZI 


"!T  is  in  Herbart  that  Pestalozzi  must  be  studied," 
said  Doctor  Mager,  a  German  author ;  doubtless  in 
the  way  that  Socrates  is  studied  in  Plato.  If,  indeed, 
we  wish  to  follow  up  some  of  Pestalozzi's  concep- 
tions in  their  philosophic  development,  it  is  perhaps 
to  Herbart  that  we  should  address  ourselves.  He 
had  visited  Pestalozzi,  in  1799,  at  his  Burgdorf 
school ;  he  had  seen  him  at  work ;  and  it  cannot  be 
denied  that  he  drew  inspiration,  on  certain  points, 
from  the  principles  of  the  Pestalozzian  method,  of 
which  he  spoke  favourably  in  three  small  works, 
published  in  1802  and  1804.1  The  desire  to  establish 
between  them  the  relation  of  master  to  disciple, 
and  the  claim  to  connect  closely  two  minds  which 
hardly  resemble  one  another,  a  deep,  subtle  theorist 
and  a  sentimental,  enthusiastic  educator,  would 
be  unwarranted.  If  Pestalozzi,  before  he  died,  had 

1  The  most  important  of  these  three  monographs  is  entitled : 
Pestalozzis  Idee  ernes  A  B  C  des  Anschauungsunterrichts  und 
wssenscha/tlich  ausgefuhrt.  Gottingen,  1802. 

3 


4  PESTALOZZI 

had  time  to  read  Herbart's  works,  —  but  he  himself 
tells  us  that  he  did  not  open  a  book  in  the  last  fifty 
I  years  of  his  life,  —  if  he  had  become  acquainted 
with  Pedagogic  generate,  which  dates  from  1806, 
it  is  probable  that  he  would  have  exclaimed,  some- 
what like  Socrates  concerning  Plato:  "What  fine 
things  this  young  man  imagines  that  I  never  thought 
of! 

It  is  in  himself  —  in  his  character,  his  life,  and 
his  actions — that  Pestalozzi  deserves  to  be  studied. 
If  to  Rousseau  he  owes  a  part  of  his  inspiration,  none 
the  less  for  that  is  the  great  Swiss  teacher  an  ini- 
tiator, an  innovator;  and  if,  moreover,  his  doctrine 
remained  incomplete  and  confused,  it  has  its  par- 
ticular value  all  the  same.  Let  us  add  that  by  anno- 
tations and  attempts  at  its  interpretation,  it  has 
often  been  disfigured.  In  a  sense,  also,  it  is  per- 
missible to  invert  the  aphorism  which  we  have 
quoted  and  to  say:  "In  order  to  understand  Her- 
bart  and  the  other  educational  philosophers,  it  is 
as  well  to  have  a  preliminary  knowledge  of  Pesta- 
lozzi." 

Michelet,  in  Nos  Fils,  hails  him  as  one  of  the  evan- 
gelists of  modern  pedagogics.  R.  H.  Quick,  in  his 
EducationalReformers,  declares  him  to  have  been  "the 
most  celebrated  of  educational  reformers."  Karl 
Schmidt,  in  his  Geschichte  der  Erziehung,  calls  him 


. 


PESTALOZZI  5 

"the  king  of  pedagogics,  the  prophet  of  the  new 
education."  I  do  not  think  that  the  history  of  edu- 
cation can  show  us  another  figure  of  such  original- 
ity, such  a  touching  physiognomy,  such  an  example 
of  impassioned  devotion  to  the  education  of  the  peo- 
ple. His  long  life  of  fourscore  years  was  dominated 
by  a  single  thought,  the  regeneration  of  humanity 
by  education.  "All  my  life  I  have  desired,"  he 
wrote  in  1801,  "and  to-day  I  still  desire  one  thing 
alone:  the  welfare  of  my  beloved  people  whose 
wretchedness  I  feel  as  it  is  felt  by  few."  He  was 
himself  wretched.  And  his  heroic  life  of  suffering, 
humiliation,  and  sacrifice  surpasses  in  its  sad  reality 
everything  that  the  novelists  of  the  school  have 
been  able  to  imagine  in  our  times,  when  recounting 
the  misfortunes  of  Jean  Coste  or  those  of  the  Insti- 
tutrice  de  village. 

He  was  not  merely  a  theoretical  pedagogue, 
calmly  drawing  up  on  paper  projects  of  reform,  with- 
out taking  the  trouble  to  apply  them.  He  was  not 
satisfied,  like  Rousseau,  with  a  platonic  philan- 
thropy, manifested  only  by  fine  words.  He  was 
above  all  a  man  of  action,  a  militant  teacher;  and 
it  is  not  his  fault  that  he  was  not  a  simple  school- 
master all  his  life.  It  was  not  alone  the  progress 
of  instruction  for  its  own  sake  that  concerned  him. 
He  worked,  acted,  and  suffered  for  the  happiness 


6  PESTALOZZI 

of  mankind.  He  wished  to  prepare  a  better-edu- 
cated humanity,  so  that  it  might  be  happier  and 
more  virtuous.  If  it  were  said  that  he  was  a  philan- 
thropist of  pedagogics,  and,  as  it  were,  the  Saint 
Vincent  de  Paul  of  education,  the  description  would 
be  very  accurate. 

For  an  immediate  realization  of  the  work  carried 
on  by  a  pedagogue,  of  whom  the  English  professor, 
Joseph  Payne,  could  say  that  "of  all  educators,  he 
is  the  one  whose  influence  has  been  the  deepest 
and  the  most  penetrating,"  it  is  sufficient  to  scan 
the  enormous  list  of  works  written  by  biographers 
or  close  critics  on  his  life  and  work.  With  Pesta- 
lozzian  books  alone  a  rich  library  could  be  formed. 
Germany  has  devoted  hundreds  of  volumes  to  him. 
In  France,  it  is  true,  his  name  has  been  pronounced 
more  often  than  his  ideas  have  been  studied.  It 
must  not  be  forgotten,  however,  that  whilst  he  was 
still  alive,  when  Fichte,  in  his  famous  Discours  a 
la  nation  allemande,  declared  that  he  expected  the 
salvation  and  regeneration  of  his  country  from  the 
application  of  Pestalozzian  methods,  French  voices 
also  were  raised  in  Pestalozzi's  honour.  In  1810, 
Madame  de  Stael  wrote  in  her  book,  De  I'Allemagne, 
that  "Pestalozzi's  school  was  one  of  the  best  insti- 
tutions of  the  century;"  .and  some  years  earlier, 
in  1807,  Maine  de  Biran,  then  sub-prefect  of  Bergerac, 


PESTALOZZI  7 

endeavoured  to  introduce  and  acclimatize  the  new 
method,  which  he  esteemed  most  highly,  in  the 
schools  of  Dordogne. 

A  hundred  years  old,  Pestalozzi's  renown  has  not  ^ 
faded.  His  glory  shines  especially  in  his  native 
land,  where  he  is  the  object  of  a  kind  of  cult.  It  even 
seems  that  these  last  years  have  seen,  as  it  were,  a 
recrudescence  and  a  resurrection  of  the  homage  ren- 
dered to  him.  It  was  on  the  12th  of  January,  1846, 
the  anniversary  of  his  birthday,  that  his  compa- 
triots raised  to  him  at  Birr,  in  Aargau,  the  first 
monument  of  their  gratitude.  In  the  last  twenty 
years,  however,  proofs  of  admiration  have  been 
multiplied;  in  Zurich  and  Yverdon  statues  have 
been  erected  to  him;  in  Burgdorf  a  medallion  and 
a  commemorative  tablet  have  been  dedicated  to 
his  memory ;  in  Zurich,  again,  it  was  under  the  pat- 
ronage of  his  name  that,  about  1875,  the  academic 
museum,  the  Pestalozzianum,  was  instituted.  And 
'to  these  monuments  perpetuating  his  memory  are 
added  very  significant  trifles,  bearing  witness  that 
the  affection  of  the  people  is  ever  his.  In  Zurich, 
I  went  into  a  bookseller's ;  there  I  found  postcards 
adorned  with  his  portrait.  I  sat  down  at  a  restau- 
rant table ;  the  menu  presented  some  of  the  scenes 
of  his  scholastic  life.  ...  In  the  Pestalozzianum, 
beside  his  manuscripts  and  books,  I  was  shown  some 


8  PESTALOZZI 

of  his  relics,  collected  by  pious  hands,  —  his  stick, 
his  snuff-box,  a  lock  of  his  hair,  his  diploma  as 
Doctor  of  Breslau  University,  conferred  on  him  in 
1817.  .  .  .  What,  however,  is  worth  more  than 
all  these  material  monuments,  is  that  the  operation 
of  his  thought  is  still  alive  and  circulates  from  school 
I  to  school.  What,  moreover,  has  contributed,  in 
recent  times,  to  revive  his  popularity,  is  the  fine 
work  of  Mr.  L.-W.  Seyffarth,  who,  after  publishing, 
from  1869  to  1872,  a  complete  edition  of  Pesta- 
lozzi's  works,  is  occupied  in  preparing  a  fresh  one, 
in  which  he  has  brought  together  a  certain  number 
of  important  writings  hitherto  unpublished. 


II 

ZURICH,  at  the  period  when  Pestalozzi  was  going 
through  his  studies  there,  was  a  hot-bed  of  intellec- 
tual life.  Never  had  "the  Athens  of  the  Limmat," 
as  it  is  sometimes  called,  better  justified  this  some- 
what ambitious  title.  It  was  the  time  when  Zurich 
was  competing  with  Leipzig,  and  Bodmer  with 
Gottsched,  when  Zurich's  writers  were  making  their 
names  known  in  ever  wider  circles.  In  1756,  Gess- 
ner  published  his  Idylles;  in  1767,  Lavater,  who  was 
Pestalozzi's  friend,  composed  his  Chants  suisses,  an 
attempt  at  popular  lyric  poetry.  Again,  it  was  the 
time  when  Zurich  was  becoming  the  meeting-place 
of  the  German  poets.  Wieland  accepted  Bodmer's 
hospitality  there  in  1753 ;  and  before  him,  in  1750, 
Klopstock  had  there  obtained  a  triumphant  recep- 
tion; surrounded  by  nine  youths  and  nine  damsels, 
—  so  many  Muses,  —  he  made  sentimental  excur- 
sions, in  a  boat  bedecked  with  flowers,  on  an  en- 
trancing lake,  reading  unpublished  fragments  of 
his  Messie  to  his  enraptured  admirers. 

But  especially  it  was  the  time  when  a  breath  of 
liberty  was  disturbing  men's  minds.  Contrat  social 


10  PESTALOZZI 

and  Emile  were  read  with  passion.  Pestalozzi  was 
quite  enraptured  by  them;  and  even  in  his  old  age 
he  remained  faithful  to  this  youthful  passion,  since 
he  wrote  in  1826 :  "  With  Herculean  might  Rousseau 
rent  asunder  the  heavy  chains  which  bound  the 
*  human  mind;  he  restored  the  child  to  itself  and 
education  to  nature."  When  Geneva,  imitating 
the  intolerance  of  the  Parliament  at  Paris,  in  its 
turn  condemned  and  expelled  Rousseau,  Zurich 
sided  against  Geneva.  Encouraged  by  its  profess- 
ors themselves,  the  university  youth  grouped  itself 
into  societies  for  study  and  for  political  or  social 
reforms.  Anonymous  pamphlets  appeared,  ener-  f 
getically  attacking  the  sheriffs,  the  bailiffs,  and  even 
certain  ministers  of  religion.  Pestalozzi  grew  up 
in  this  inflamed  environment.  Some  years  later, 
he  made  a  wicked  bailiff  the  villain,  in  his  romance 
of  Leonard  et  Gertrude.  From  his  twentieth  year, 
however,  he  was  already  committed  to  the  new  ideas. 
JSe-was  looked  upon  as  a  revolutionary.  With  a 
few  friends,  the  "patriots,"  as  they  were  called,  with 
Lavater,  among  others,  he  caused  himself  to  be 
prosecuted  for  complicity  in  a  pretended  conspiracy 
against  the  safety  of  the  State.  Whilst  the  govern- 
ment of  Zurich  banished  one  of  these  innocent  con- 
spirators, guilty  only  of  denouncing  the  embezzle- 
ments of  Bailiff  Grebel  and  Sheriff  Brunner,  and  the 


PESTALOZZI 

evil  conduct  of  Pastor  Hottinger,  others,  and  Pesta- 

lozzi  himself,  were  imprisoned,  tried,  and  fined.      ^     o  ^ 

From  these  passionate  struggles  of  his  youth, 
Pestalozzi  imbibed,  and  even  whilst  imbibing  dis- 
played, the  den^ocratic  faith  which  animated  him 
throughout  his  life  and  made  of  him  the  indefatiga- 
ble supporter  of  the  poor  and  suffering  against  the 
abuses  of  the  great.  Other  influences,  however, 
helped  in  the  formation  of  his  noble  character. 

*•  Home  surroundings,  still  more  than  social  environ- 
ment, acted  on  his  affections.    At  the  age  of  six, 
he  lost  his  father,  a  medical  practitioner  in  Zurich. 
He  is  peculiarly  his  mother's  son.    Rousseau  was\ 
badly  brought  up   by  a  fantastic,  careless  father;  1 
Pestalozzi  was  well  brought  up  by  a  good,  intelli-  j 
gent  mother.    This  is  partly  responsible  for  the  - 

S  diversity  of  their  characters  and  destinies.  Left 
destitute  with  a  daughter  and  two  sons,  the  poor 
widow  devoted  herself  entirely  to  her  children's 
education.  She  was  assisted  by  a  wonderfully 
devoted  servant,  faithful  Babeli,  who  had  promised 
the  dying  father  —  and  she  kept  her  word  —  never 
to  forsake  the  family  as  long  as  she  lived.  In  this 
humble  home,  under  this  watchful,  tender  care,  the 
child  learned  early  the  virtues  of  simplicity  and 
frugality,  which  the  conditions  of  an  arduous  life 
imposed  as  a  rigorous  obligation  on  the  man.  There 


12  PESTALOZZI 

also  he  acquired  an  unalterable  purity  of  sentiment. 
Thence;  moreover,  with  all  these  qualities,  were  per- 
chance derived  some  of  the  defects  of  his  incom- 
v,  plete  mind,  sensitive  rather  than  meditative.  He 
often  lacked  practical  sense.  In  1765,  his  friend 
Bluntschli,  who  died  at  the  age  of  twenty-five,  said 
to  him:  " Never  engage  in  an  enterprise  without 
having  at  your  side  a  man  whose  experience  and  cool 
reason  will  guarantee  you  against  the  dangers  to 
which  your  goodness  and  trusting  confidence  will 
expose  you."  Niederer,  who  was  one  of  the  collabo- 
rators of  his  old  age,  says  that  in  him  were  to  be 
found  the  persevering  will  of  a  man  and  the 
courage  of  a  hero,  united  with  the  sensibility  and 
delicacy  of  a  woman  and  the  confiding  simplicity 
of  a  child. 

Pestalozzi's  studies  were  of  the  most  serious  kind. 
He  quickly  renounced  theology  and  the  ecclesias- 
tical calling  which  had  at  first  attracted  him.  The 
cause  of  his  retirement  was  doubtless  the  spirit  of 
liberty  obtained  from  reading  Rousseau,  rather  than 
the  alleged  misadventure  of  an  unsuccessful  sermon ; 
it  is  indeed  narrated  that  he  stopped  short  after  the 
first  words  of  his  discourse.  He  turned  to  legal 
studies,  in  order  to  acquire  the  knowledge  neces- 
sary for  a  politician  and  social  reformer,  as  he  wished 
to  become.  He  read  the  ancient  authors  lovingly, 


PESTALOZZI  13 

and  in  his  twentieth  year  produced  a  little  work  in 
which  he  dealt  with  the  legislation  of  Sparta. 

It  was  not,  however,  classical  reading  or  theoretical 
revery  alone  which  prepared  him  to  become  the 
free  citizen,  the  friend  of  humanity.  The  circum- 
stances of  his  life  procured  for  him  a  premature  ex- 
perience of  social  realities.  He  spent  his  holidays 
in  the  country,  either  at  Hongg,  with  his  paternal 
grandfather,  Pastor  Pestalozzi,  or  with  his  mother's 
brother,  Doctor  Hotze,  at  Richtersweil.  With  t 
he  visited  the  poor  and  the  sick.  He  was  brought 
into  contact  with  the  sufferings  of  the  people.  He 
heard  the  lamentations  of  the  peasants.  Pity  en- 
tered his  young  heart  and  dwelt  there  ever  after. 
Since  it  is  true  that  human  personality  is  largely 
the  reflection  of  the  surroundings  in  which  it  develops, 
it  must  be  taken  into  consideration  that  Pestalozzi 
spent  his  youth  amongst  good  people,  that  he  grew 
up  in  an  atmosphere  of  uprightness;  and  he  was 
influenced  by  it  during  the  whole  of  his  life.  _^ 

One  day,  whilst  quite  a  youngster,  having  a  little 
pocket-money,  he  went  into  the  shop  of  a  neighbor, 
a  confectioner  of  Zurich,  to  buy  some  dainties. 
The  young  lady  who  was  serving,  the  shopkeeper's 
own  daughter,  Anna  Schulthess,  whom  Pestalozzi 
was  to  marry  some  years  later,  understanding  her 
business  interests  none  too  well,  as  it  would  seem, 


14  PESTALOZZI 

dissuaded  the  child  from  satisfying  his  gluttony 
and  advised  him  to  save  his  money  for  a  more  useful 
purpose.  One  of  the  first  lessons  of  wisdom  by  which 
he  profited  was  thus  received  from  the  person  who 
was  for  forty-six  years,  from  1769  till  1815,  to  share 
his  hopes  and  disappointments,  to  partake  of  his 
too  rare  joys  and  the  long  succession  of  his  sorrows. 
Anna  Schulthess  herself,  however,  was  not  without 
defects :  she  was  somewhat  coquettish ;  and  Pesta- 
lozzi  was  perhaps  present  at  the  conversation  which 
she  once  had  with  Bluntschli,  their  mutual  friend. 
She  asked  him  for  his  opinion  on  an  elegant  assort- 
ment of  ribbons,  with  which  she  wished  to  adorn 
herself.  But  Bluntschli  answered  her  severely: 
"  Whilst  your  poor  neighbour  is  in  greater  need  of  a 
thaler  to  buy  food  than  you  are  of  this  bauble,  you 
have  a  better  use  for  your  money." 

The  gentle,  salutary  influences  of  family  life  were 
continued  for  Pestalozzi  in  the  conjugal  dwelling. 
Pestalozzi's  wife  was  worthy  of  him,  and  their 
marriage  was  a  union  of  souls.  The  letters  which 
they  exchanged  have  been  preserved,  and  never 
did  betrothed  lovers  correspond  in  such  terms. 
Far  from  displaying  himself  to  the  greatest  advan- 
tage, Pestalozzi  complacently  detailed  all  his  defects, 
his  absent-mindedness,  his  neglect  of  dress,  his 
unattractive  exterior.  His  love  declarations  seem 


PESTALOZZI  15 

like  a  confession  of  his  sins.  He  exhorted  Anna  to 
reflect  well  before  coming  to  a  decision.  He  told 
her  that  he  lacked  foresight  greatly,  that  he  had 
no  presence  of  mind,  and  felt  others'  misfortunes  to 
the  extent  of  being  unhappy  himself  and  losing 
all  peace  of  mind ;  he  warned  her  that  he  would  be 
first  a  citizen,  then  a  husband;  that  she  would 
have  to  suffer,  that  it  would  be  necessary  to 
know  how  to  sacrifice  family  and  interests,  both 
personal  and  selfish,  to  the  superior  interests  of 
humanity.  In  short,  he  traced  out  his  life's  pro- 
gramme. But  Anna  also  had  a  noble  heart. 
She  attached  no  importance  to  a  badly  tied 
cravat,  and  although  she  let  Pestalozzi  under- 
stand that  she  was  well  aware  that  he  was  not  exactly 
beautiful,  that  nature  would  have  been  harsh  to 
him  "if  she  had  not  given  him  large,  dark  eyes  in 
which  she  portrayed  the  goodness  of  his  strong,  serious 
mind/ '  she  did  not  hesitate:  she  plighted  her  troth, 
in  spite  of  her  parents'  opposition,  in  spite  of  the 
tears  of  her  mother,  who  said  to  her,  — and  she  was  not 
mistaken:  "You  must  resign  yourself  to  privations; 
you  must  be  satisfied  with  bread  and  water !  .  .  ." 

Married  at   the   age   of  twenty-three,   in   1769,  v 
Pestalozzi  was  a  father  a  year  later;    and  if  the 
educator    had    been    awakened    by    philanthropic 
ideas,  his  paternal  love  finally  determined  his  voea- 


16  PESTALOZZI 

tion.  If  he  became  a  teacher,  it  is  because  humanity 
was  dear  to  him,  and  also  because  he  tenderly  cher- 
ished his  only  child.  jHis  first  dream,  which  lasted 
till  his  death,  was  to  comfort  and  regenerate  man- 
kind, especially  the  poor,  by  instruction  and  educa- 
tion. In  his  twentieth  year,  a  journalist  of  original- 
ity, he  wrote  down  in  the  foremost  rank,  amongst 
the  prayers  which  he  formulated  for  the  improve- 
ment of  the  people's  condition,  "that  some  one  might 
^  be  willing  to  draw  up  in  simple  form  some  educational 
^principles  within  the  reach  of  all.77  The  father  it  was 
who  responded  to  this  appeal,  or  at  least,  attempted  to 
do  so,  by  jotting  down,  in  the  private  Journal  which 
he  wrote  out  in  1774,  the  results  of  his  son  Jaqueli7s 
education.  This  education  was  his  first  experi- 
ment in  pedagogics.  He  brought  to  it  no  precon- 
ceived notions.  Indeed,  all  his  life  he  was  nothing 
but  an  experimentalist,  seeking  the  truth  in  action, 
in  teaching,  without  a  systematic  mind  or  a  plan 
drawn  up  beforehand. 

With  Jaqueli,  he  observed,  hesitated,  groped:  he 
never  ceased  to  grope.  He  hesitated  between 
the  principles  of  authority  and  of  liberty.  In  this 
first  attempt,  however,  were  present  the  germs  of 
most  of  the  ideas  which  dominated  all  his  pedagogics : 
to  be  in  no  hurry,  to  make  clear  but  to  the  sight 
and  to  the  understanding,  to  develop  the  senses,  to 


PESTALOZZI  17 

take  nature  as  guide,  to  attach  more  importance  to 
things  than  to  words,  to  respect  the  child's  dawning 
liberty.  ..."  To  know  words  which  do  not  respond 
to  precise  ideas  is  an  immense  barrier  to  the  truth.77 
— "  All  instruction  would  not  be  worth  a  farthing  if  it 
necessitated  the  loss  of  a  child's  courage  and  gayety." 
He  wrote  later:  " Laughter  is  a  gift  of  God;  let/ 
children  laugh ;  encourage  merriment  in  them.77 
Imitation  of  Rousseau  is  apparent:  at  the  age  of 
eleven,  Jaqueli,  like  Emile,  could  hardly  read 
and  write.1  He  exercised  his  senses  more  than 
his  memory  and  judgment.  His  education  was  /^ 
chiefly  negative,  obeying  nature7s  necessities,  and 
not  man's  will.  Pestalozzi's  good  sense,  however, 
showed  him  what  was  chimerical  in  Rousseau7s 
Utopias.  Experience  taught  him  that  it  is  at  times 
necessary  to  oppose  nature.  He  prescribed  hours 
of  regular  work  for  Jaqueli.  He  shut  him  up,  when 
four  years  old,  to  force  him  to  study.  He  found 
reasons  for  liberty  and  invoked  other  reasons  for 
obedience.  In  the  same  way,  false  to  Rousseau's 
principles  in  this  also,  he  did  not  allow  the  chikTs 

1  Jaqueli  was  sent  to  college,  at  Basle,  in  1784.  He  did  not 
fulfil  his  father's  hopes.  Very  sickly  from  childhood,  he  died 
young,  in  1800,  leaving  a  son,  Gottlieb,  the  consolation  of  his 
grandfather's  old  age.  Gottlieb,  at  first  apprenticed  as  tanner's 
workman,  returned  to  Yverdon  in  1817.  There  he  married  one 
of  Schmid's  sisters. 


18  PESTALOZZI 

affectionate  feelings  to  remain  dormant,  and  he 
strove  to  develop  affection  in  Jaqueli  before  all  else. 
"I  wish  only  to  be  a  schoolmaster/ '  replied  Pesta- 
lozzi,  twenty  years  later,  to  those  of  his  friends  who 
had  been  brought  into  power  by  the  Swiss  Revolu- 
tion of  1798,  when  they  offered  him  administrative 
posts  and  lucrative  appointments.  His  true  voca- 
tion was  that  of  schoolmaster,  and  all  his  life  he 
longed  to  teach,  but  very  little  of  his  time  was  so 
employed.  Circumstances  and  events,  which  so 
often  disturbed  the  long  career  in  which  we  are  about 
to  follow  him,  prevented  him  from  fulfilling  his  wish. 
He  could  not  continue  even  the  education  of  his 
son,  which  he  had  begun  with  such  delight,  at  least 
not  under  the  same  conditions,  in  the  isolation  and 
privacy  of  family  life.  In  1775,  the  school  for  in- 
digent children  at  Neuhof  was  opened ;  and  Pesta- 
lozzi,  who  was  going  to  give  his  entire  affections  to 
the  little  unfortunates  whom  he  had  collected  there, 
did  still  more :  ,  he  gave  them  for  a  comrade  his 
well-beloved  son,  Jaqueli,  as  though  to  show  clearly 
that  he  was  a  father  to  them  all. 


Ill 

NEUHOF,  Stans,  Burgdorf,  Yverdon,  are  the  four 
stages  of  Pestalozzi's  pedagogical  apostolate,  we 
may  almost  say  the  four  stations  of  his  Calvary; 
for,  in  the  dreary  shadow  of  his  existence,  darkened 
by  so  many  clouds,  the  days  of  joy  and  peace  were 
but  passing  gleams  of  light.  At  Neuhof  his  mis- 
fortunes began. 

Pestalozzi  had  left  Zurich,  in  1768,  to  settle  in  the 
canton  of  Aargau,  in  the  open  country;  he  was 
impelled  by  various  reasons.  In  the  first  place,  the 
love  of  the  country  called  to  him.  Like  Rousseau,  (Jj 
he  had  become  disgusted  with  towns,  and  he  would 
willingly  have  indorsed  the  saying,  omne  malum  ex 
urbe.  In  addition  to  this,  he  had  to  seek  a  profes- 
sion which  would  provide  him  with  a  livelihood. 
He  naively  believed  that  he  was  destined  to  become 
a  farmer,  and  as  a  farmer  he  settled  near  Birr.  After 
a  makeshift  establishment,  he  built  an  unassuming 
house,  which  he  named  Neuhof,  "the  new  farm." 
He  established  himself  there,  first  with  his  mother, 
then  with  his  young  wife.  He  arrived  rich  in  hope 

19 


20  PESTALOZZI 

»« 

and  in  illusion.  He  Reckoned  on  makirfg  a  fortune 
by  cultivating  land  which  till  then  had  been  barren. 
He  had  gone  through  a  rapid  technical  apprentice- 
ship with  Tschiffeli,  ^  agriculturist  in  Berne  can- 
ton. He  had  returned  with  the  horny  hands  of  a 
field  labourer  and  witfy.a  small  stock  of  agronomic 
ideas.  Furnished  witli  this  newly  acquired  knowl- 
edge, he  flattered  himself  that  he  wousd  profitably 
work  his  rural  domaifi.  and  gain  his  indejtejjderice : 
"I  shall  become  independent  of  the  whole  worlcl." 
By  new  methods  of  cultivation,  by  planting  madder 
and  starting  gardening  operations,  he  hoped  to  fer- 
tilize the  few  acres  of  poor  ground  which  he  had 
bought  at  a  cheap  rate;  just  as  he  dreamed  later  of 
transforming  difficult  child  natures  by  applying  his 
personal  methods  of  instruction. 

It  was  not,  however,  care  for  his  material  interests 
alone  which  sent  Pestalozzi  to  live  in  the  country. 
The  young  patriot  of  Zurich  had  not  bidden  farewell 
to  his  aspirations  to  become  a  reformer.  If  he  went 
to  the  country  people,  it  was  out  of  sympathy  for 
the  wretchedness  of  the  toilers  of  the  fields.  When 
quite  little,  he  had  said,  "When  I  am  big,  I  shall 
support  the  peasants.'7  He  wished  now  to  keep 
his  word,  to  seek  the  means  of  curing  poverty  and 
lightening  the  ignorance  of  the  country  people. 
This  secret  thought  of  becoming  an  educator  in  the 


PESTALOZZI  21 

village  is  shown  clearly  by  what  he  wrote  to  his 
betrothed  in  1768,  to  persuade  her  to  follow  him 
and  to  leave  Zurich.  "We  must,"  said  he,  "set 
up  our  cottage  home  far  from  that  centre  of  vice.  .  .  . 
When  I  am  in  the  country,  if  I  see  a  child  with  prom- 
ise of  a  beautiful  mind,  and  in  need  of  bread,  I  shall 
take  it  by  the  hand  and  make  a  good  citizen  of  it." 
As  Anna  Schulthess,  and  especially  her  parents, 
became  uneasy  concerning  the  fortune  that  such 
an  adventurous  enterprise  had  in  store  for  him, 
he  invoked  the  high  moral  incentives  of  the  services 
to  be  rendered  to  the  poor  and  to  humanity:  "In 
order  to  be  of  service  to  our  fellow-citizens, 
should  we  not  restrict  our  personal  needs?  .  .  . 
To  give  poor  children  the  milk  which  I  like  I 
shall  joyfully  content  myself  with  drinking  cold 
water.  ..." 

That  is,  moreover,  what  happened.  Neuhof  was 
not  for  long  a  simple  agricultural  undertaking.  In 
spite  of  unremitting  labour  and  prodigies  of  economy, 
the  defeat  was  complete  at  the  end  of  a  few  years. 
Bankruptcy  was  imminent.  In  vain  generous 
friends,  who  tired  eventually,  had  advanced  funds 
to  Pestalozzi.  In  vain  his  wife  had  made  over  the 
greater  part  of  her  patrimony.  He  struggled;  he 
worked  with  his  own  hands;  but  all  in  vain.  In 
1775,  the  ruin  was  complete.  The  fields  on  which 


22  PESTALOZZI 

he  had  built  up  illusory  hopes,  from  which  he 
expected  extraordinary  returns  and  profits,  had 
to  be  sold.  The  ownership  of  the  house  and  a 
few  plots  of  land  alone  remained  to  him.  And 
for  the  first  time  the  ill-starred  great  man  had 
to  cry  out:  "The  dream  of  my  life  has  faded 
away!  .  .  ." 

If,  however,  the  agricultural  enterprise  of  Neuhof 
ended  in  financial  disaster,  it  was  the  occasion  of  a 
moral  triumph.  Ruined,  having  lost  almost  his  all, 
what  did  Pestalozzi  do?  He  opened  a  refuge  for 
poor  children.  He  himself  was  poor,  to  almost  the 
same  degree  as  the  unfortunate  children  whom  he 
harboured,  fed,  arid  clothed,  and  whom  he  was  at  the 
same  time  trying  to  instruct  and  educate.  With 
them  he  shared  what  little  bread  he  had.  Never 
was  the  spirit  of  sacrifice  carried  so  far.  It 
is  in  memory  of  this  charitable  effort  that 
Pestalozzi  was  able  to  say,  "I  myself  have  lived 
like  a  beggar,  that  I  might  teach  beggars  to  live 
like  men." 

Success  seemed  at  first  to  attend  this  bold  stroke. 
The  refuge  opened  with  a  score  of  children.  The 
number  increased  as  time  went  on,  but  never  ex- 
ceeded a  hundred.  They  were  for  the  most  part 
little  vagrants,  whom  "the  angel  of  beneficence,"  as 
Madame  de  Krudner  called  him,  picked  up  at  random 


PESTALOZZI  23 

and  without  selection,  on  the  highways.  Did  they 
not  need  his  help  and  care  so  much  the  more  as  they 
were  more  vicious  and  wretched?  Boys  or  girls, 
they  varied  in  age  from  ten  to  twenty.  Some  were 
natural  children,  without  family.  There  were  con- 
victs7 sons  among  the  number.  They  came  to  him 
covered  with  rags  and  vermin.  Never  was  less 
promising  matter  offered  to  the  efforts  of  an  edu- 
cator. "They  were,"  said  he  himself,  "specimens 
of  the  lowest  stage  of  humanity." 

Pestalozzi  divided  the  time  of  these  singular  pupils  ( 
between  manual  labor  and  a  few  intellectual  exer-j,. 
cises,  language  lessons,  moral  and  religious  explana- 
tions: "They  were  not  allowed  to  forget  God,  their 
Father  and  Saviour;"  and  this  was  almost  their 
entire  mental  training.  During  the  greater  part  of 
the  day,  the  children  were  busy  in  the  garden  or 
fields,  or  occupied  in  industrial  work.  For  Pesta- 
lozzi, fertile  in  expedients,  had  joined  to  his  farm 
a  cheese  dairy  and  also  spinning  works.  In  the  fine 
season,  work  was  done  in  the  open  air;  on  bad  days 
and  in  winter,  cotton  was  spun.  Pestalozzi  had  en- 
listed the  services  of  a  certain  number  of  workmen, 
weavers  or  others.  It  was  the  application  of  one 
of  the  main  ideas  of  his  pedagogics :  the  association 
of  handicraft  with  elementary  education.  A  school 
without  a  workshop,  a  school  which  is  not  at  the  same 


24  PESTALOZZI 

time  an  apprenticeship  to  a  livelihood,  seemed  an 
absurdity  to  him.1 

Undoubtedly  it  is  not  to  be  supposed  that  dis- 
tinguished men  could  issue  from  the  school  at  Neu- 
hof,  recruited  as  it  was  from  such  abnormal  material. 
One,  however,  is  mentioned,  the  painter  Gottfried, 
celebrated  under  his  cognomen  of  the  "cat  Raphael." 
What  could  be  done  with  pupils  of  whom  Pestalozzi, 
in  an  account  published  in  1778,  gives  us  particulars 
such  as  the  following?  " Barbara  Brunner  is  seven- 
teen years  old;  she  came  to  us  in  a  state  of  complete 
ignorance  and  extreme  wildness.  .  .  ."  Another 
lass  showed  all  the  signs  of  an  "unimaginable  brut- 
ishness."  The  boys  were  no  better.  Pestalozzi  por- 
trays them  for  us,  sly,  distrustful,  heedless,  enfeebled 
by  privation,  accustomed  to  idling.  Nevertheless, 
there  is  no  doubt  that  the  beneficent  action  of  an 
ardent  and  enthusiastic  educator  had  an  influence 
for  good  on  the  character  of  some  of  these  poor  crea- 
tures, whom  he  strove  to  deliver  from  the  evil  instincts 
of  their  nature  and  the  depraved  habits  of  their 
childhood.  Very  careful  not  to  train  them  in  ad- 
vance of  their  future  condition,  he  thought  less  about 
their  instruction  than  about  their  moral  regeneration. 

1  This  is  the  idea  which  he  set  forth,  at  this  period,  in  his  Lettres 
sur  V education  de  la  jeunesse  pauvre  des  campagnes.  Seyffarth's 
edition,  Vol.  VIII. 


PESTALOZZI  25 

At  the  end  of  a  few  months,  some,  at  least,  of  these 
fallen  beings  were  quite  transformed.  They  entered 
the  refuge  in  an  abject  condition;  they  left  it,  if  not 
cured  of  all  their  moral  blemishes,  at  least  perceptibly 
improved  and  capable  of  earning  an  honest  living. 
The  pedagogic  trial  of  Neuhof  was,  however,  to  fail, 
as  the  agricultural  undertaking  had  done.  The  estab- 
lishment passed  through  crises,  followed  by  some  re- 
turns of  hope.  In  1778,  Pestalozzi  wrote:  "  After  a 
time  of  privation  surpassing  anything  that  could  be 
imagined,  my  establishment  is  saved."  Generous 
benefactors,  indeed,  had  come  to  his  assistance.  From 
the  beginning,  in  1776,  the  philanthropist,  Iselin,  a 
native  of  Bale,  who  was  "a  veritable  father"  to  him, 
had  recommended  this  interesting  attempt  at  regen- 
erating the  masses ' '  to  the  friends  of  humanity ."  Some 
subscriptions  delayed  the  final  ruin.  Moreover,  a  large- 
hearted  woman,  a  humble  servant,  Elisabeth  Naf,1 

1  Elisabeth  Naf  married,  in  1802,  Mathias  Krusi,  the  brother 
of  Pestalozzi's  first  collaborator.  She  it  was  who  served  for  the 
pattern  of  the  ideal  woman  personified  in  Gertrude,  of  whom  Pesta- 
lozzi said,  likening  her  somewhat  pompously  to  the  sun :  "  Reader, 
I  should  like  to  find  you  a  perceptible  representation  of  this  woman, 
so  that  her  silent  activity  may  be  understood  and  admired.  What 
I  am  about  to  say  is  tremendous,  but  I  venture  to  say  it:  thus 
does  God's  sun  journey  from  morn  till  eventide;  .  .  .  when  it 
sinks  to  rest,  you  know  that  it  will  rise  once  more  on  the  morrow, 
to  reanimate  the  earth.  .  .  .  This  great  sun  which  is  earth's 
life-giver  is  the  image  of  Gertrude  and  of  every  woman  who  makes 
the  family  chamber  into  God's  sanctuary.  ..." 


26  PESTALOZZI 

had  come  to  offer  her  services  to  Pestalozzi, 
and  to  bring  back  a  little  order  into  a  house  left 
somewhat  neglected  from^  sickness  or  the  absences 
of  Madame  Pestalozzi.  Elisabeth  Naf,  like  Babeli, 
was  the  type  of  those  daughters  of  the  people 
who,  by  an  admirable  instinct  of  devotion,  are 
attached  for  life  to  an  unfortunate  family.  It  is 
of  Elisabeth  that  Pestalozzi  said:  "I  should  turn 
and  be  uneasy  in  my  tomb,  nor  should  I  be  happy 
even  in  heaven,  if  I  did  not  know  that  after  my 
death  she  will  be  more  honoured  than  myself.  .  .  . 
Without  her,  I  should  long  have  ceased  to  exist." 
But  money  difficulties  multiplied.  Always  sub- 
ject to  illusions,  Pestalozzi  had  hoped  that  the  pupils' 
work  would  produce  enough  to  cover  the  expenses  of 
their  maintenance.  He  himself  attended  the  mar- 
kets and  fairs  to  sell  his  cotton  stuffs  and  thread; 
but  the  receipts  were  wholly  insufficient.  His  pupils' 
lack  of  discipline  also  caused  him  bitter  disappoint- 
ment. Those  who  had  relatives,  worked  upon  by 
covetous  families,  no  sooner  received  their  new 
clothes  from  the  generosity  of  the  poorest  of  men, 
than  they  ran  away  and  appeared  no  more.  Those 
who  were  orphans  were  at  times  preferable.  In  the 
school  itself,  Pestalozzi  could  not  make  himself 
respected.  The  moment  his  back  was  turned,  the 
rascals  made  fun  of  him.  His  crops  were  ravaged 


PESTALOZZI  27 

by  hail.  Epidemic  diseases,  measles  and  scab, 
raged  amongst  the  children.  Doctors  were  needed; 
but  how  were  they  to  be  paid?  Courage  cannot 
meet  all  needs.  Never  did  Pestalozzi  better  appre- 
ciate the  disproportion  between  what  he  desired  and 
what  he  could  do.  They  suffered  from  cold,  and  at 
times  from  hunger.  In  1780,  Pestalozzi  had  to  give 
up  the  impossible  struggle,  in  which  he  had  ex- 
hausted all  his  strength  and  all  his  resources. 


IV 

EIGHTEEN  years  passed  by  —  years  of  material 
poverty  and  moral  discouragement  for  Pestalozzi, 
from  the  day  on  which  the  last  beggar  child  left 
the  refuge  at  Neuhof  to  that  on  which  the  first 
orphan  entered  the  refuge  at  Stans.  A  period  of 
waiting  and  inaction,  during  which  "he  ate  away 
his  heart/ 7  as  he  said,  "  swallowed  up  in  the  mire  of 
his  wretchedness/7  living  the  life  "of  a  plant  trampled 
at  the  roadside.7'  Pestalozzi  spent  these  sad  years 
at  Neuhof,  in  the  humble  dwelling  which  he  had 
retained.  Neuhof,  moreover,  was  always  his  chosen 
abode.  There  his  son  had  been  born;  there  he  had 
reared  him;  thither  he  returned  when  his  term  of 
life  was  coming  to  an  end,  weary  and  ill,  to  write 
Destinees  de  ma  vie,  the  Chant  du  Cygne,  a  kind 
of  autobiography,  and  then  to  die.  From  1780  to 
1798,  he  often  knew  dire  privation.  But  he  suffered 
still  more  from  the  feeling  of  his  powerlessness,  from 
the  downfall  of  his  hopes,  and  from  the  interruption 
to  his  career  of  activity.  He  had  not  even  the  con- 
solation of  his  neighbours7  sympathy.  The  peasants, 

28 


PESTALOZZI  29 

who  have  no  great  liking  for  unsuccessful  enter- 
prises, looked  on  him  as  a  poor  madman. 

At  any  rate,  whilst  waiting  for  the  means  of  re- 
commencing his  life  of  action,  he  worked  with  his 
mind;  he  meditated  and  wrote.  These  eighteen 
years  were  not  lost.  It  was  at  this  time  that  he 
composed  most  of  his  works.  In  1780,  he  published 
the  Soiree  d'un  ermite,  a  series  of  reflections  pre- 
sented in  the  form  of  short  aphorisms,  having  for 
their  main  object  the  raising  of  the  people  by  edu-  , 
cation;  in  1781  appeared  the  first  volume  of  Leonard 
et  Gertrude,  the  celebrated  popular  novel,  which  had 
a  brilliant  success  and  which  made  him  famous  in 
a  day;  the  three  last  parts  were  issued  in  1783, 1785, 
and  1787 ; 1  but  the  public  welcome  was  colder  for 
these.  In  1782,  Pestalozzi  published  Christophe 
et  Else,  another  novel,  "the  second  book  for  the 
people,"  which  passed  unnoticed,  and  which  he  had 
designed  as  an  educational  manual  for  the  use  of 
the  actual  school  (Realschule),  and  of  the  universal 
school.  fc  Lastly,  in  1797,  appeared  the  Fables,  which 
he  had  begun  to  write  about  1782,  and  which,  whilst 
possessing  a  certain  literary  value,  are  especially 
social  in  character ;  and  a  work  which  he  considered 

1  Among  Pestalozzi's  unpublished  manuscripts  have  been  found 
two  other  supplementary  parts  of  Leonard  et  Gertrude:  the  fifth, 
in  which  he  dealt  with  government,  and  the  sixth,  which  is  purely 
pedagogical. 


30  PESTALOZZI 

the  most  important  of  his  writings,  the  Recherches 
sur  la  marche  de  la  nature  dans  le  developpement  de 
V esprit  humain.  This  was  an  essay  on  general  phi- 
losophy, in  which,  in  spite  of  painstaking  effort,  the 
inadequacy  and  weakness  of  his  abstract  thought  are 
left  too  much  in  evidence  by  the  author.  Beyond 
all  doubt,  Pestalozzi  had  literary  talent ;  and  Leonard 
et  Gertrude,  besides  the  Fables,  proves  that  by  his 
simple  conceptions,  his  penetrating,  intimate  ob- 
servations, and,  above  all,  by  his  feeling,  he  was 
capable  of  distinguishing  himself  in  works  of  popular 
literature.  But  he  was  by  no  means  equipped  for 
a  work  of  philosophic  generalization.  The  Recherches, 
though  they  obtained  Fichte's  attention,  were  not 
at  all  successful  and  scarcely  deserved  to  be.  Pesta- 
lozzi might  have  had  more  success  if  he  had  tried 
dramatic  literature,  as  at  one  time  he  thought  of 
doing :  he  might  have  inaugurated,  a  hundred  years 
in  advance,  the  " Popular  Plays.'7 

Pestalozzi  had  become  an  author  from  necessity 
still  more  than  from  liking.  "I  would  have  made 
wigs,"  said  he,  mournfully,  "to  give  bread  to  my 
wife  and  child."  But  his  writings,  if  they  were  his 
livelihood,  earned  him  besides  a  beginning  of  repu- 
tation and  glory.  The  hermit  of  Neuhof,  scoffed 
at  and  ridiculed  by  his  near  neighbours,  became  a 
personage  afar  off.  The  legislative  Assembly  con- 


PESTALOZZI  31 

ferred  on  him  the  title  of  French  citizen  by  the  de- 
cree of  the  26th  August,  1792,  in  which  it  was  stated 
that  "men  who,  by  their  writings  and  their  courage, 
had  served  the  cause  of  liberty  and  freedom  of  m 
could  not  be  looked  upon  as  foreigners  in  France/' 
Pestalozzi's  name  was  there  written  down  in  good 
company,  beside  glorious  names,  such  as  Washing- 
ton, Kosciusko,  Schiller,  Klopstock,  and  a  few  others. 

From  Germany  also  came  to  him  precious  testi- 
mony of  interest  and  sympathy.  In  the  same  year 
which  saw  him  proclaimed  a  French  citizen,  he  was 
favourably  received,  on  making  a  journey  to  Leipzig, 
by  Goethe,  Wieland,  Klopstock,  and  Herder.  In 
the  following  year,  he  entered  into  relations  with 
Fichte,  who  was  to  remain  his  friend  forever,  and 
who  said  of  him:  "He  is  ugly,  he  is  dressed  like  a 
peasant,  but  he  is  so  full  of  feeling  that  few  men  can 
compare  with  him." 

The  author's  success  did  not  make  Pestalozzi 
forget  the  fundamental  aspiration  of  his  life.  He 
still  wished  to  be  a  teacher,  but  there  was  to  be  a 
revolution  ere  he  could  resume  the  role,  and  then 
only  for  a  very  short  time,  in  the  improvised  or- 
phanage, which  the  new  government  of  the  Swiss 
Confederation  organized  at  Stans,  in  172&* 

In  Pestalozzi's  academic  life,  the  Stans  experi- 
ment appears  to  us  to  have  been  the  heroic  moment, 


32  PESTALOZZI 

the  moment  when  he  was  most  truly  himself,  and 
when  he  showed  most  clearly  all  the  treasures  of 
devotion  and  tenderness  which  his  heart  contained. 
He  was  fifty-two  years  old.  Already,  as  his  friend 
Stapfer,  minister  of  arts  and  sciences,  said,  "he  was 
fighting  against  the  approach  of  old  age."  And  at 
an  age  when  some  of  our  teachers  already  think 
of  taking  their  pension,  he  undertook  the  direction 
of  a  school  of  children,  aged  from  six  to  ten,  under 
most  unfavourable  conditions.  There  was,  indeed, 
nothing  tempting  in  the  task.  It  has  been  said, 
and  not  without  reason,  that  in  choosing  Pestalozzi, 
the  Swiss  Directorate  made  a  blunder.  The  up- 
bringing of  orphans  in  a  devastated  country,  laid 
waste  by  the  civil  war,  was  to  be  undertaken,  and 
it  was  a  representative  of  the  victorious  party,  it 
was  a  democrat  and  heretic,  who  was  sent  to  the 
vanquished  people  in  their  exasperation.  Pesta- 
lozzi came  to  preach  peace  and  humanity  in  a  region, 
the  Nildwalden,  where,  on  the  very  eve  of  his  arrival, 
the  French  army,  joined  to  the  Swiss  army,  had 
waged  a  cruel  war.  Nearly  four  hundred  men, 
women,  and  children  had  been  killed ;  as  many  houses 
had  been  burned;  priests  had  been  massacred  at 
the  altars ;  Stans  had  been  half  destroyed  by  fire. 
Moreover,  it  was  a  Protestant  who  was  sent  as 
educator  to  a  devout  Catholic  population,  made 


PESTALOZZI  33 

fanatical  by  the  preaching  of  the  Capuchins,  to  make 
trial  of  lay  education  in  a  transformed  convent. 

Pestalozzi  knew  what  obstacles  he  would  encoun- 
ter. Anybody  else  would  have  been  afraid,  but 
he  had  no  hesitation.  He  had  so  long  been  pining 
away  "in  rage  and  despair"  at  his  inaction.  He 
issued  from  a  species  of  moral  death  throe.  The 
mission  offered  him  at  Stans  was  for  him  a  resurrec- 
tion. He  was  at  last  to  be  able  to  apply  the  ideas 
which  he  had  set  forth  in  Leonard  et  Gertrude. 
"I  am  effacing  the  shame  of  my  life,"  said  he,  in  a 
triumphant  shout.  ...  "I  feel  myself  become  a 
man  again."  He  perceived  no  better  possible  em- 
ployment for  his  activity  than  to  struggle  against 
stupidity,  coarseness,  ignorance,  and  vice.  The  gov- 
ernment had  thought  of  intrusting  him  with  the 
control  of  a  normal  school.  He  preferred  to  go  to  the 
infants,  feeling  strongly  that  elementary  education 
was  his  true  vocation.  "To  realize  my  life's  dream 
I  would  have  agreed  to  go  and  make  my  attempt  on 
the  highest  summits  of  the  Alps,  without  fire  or 
water.  .  .  ." 

There  have  been  Swiss  historians  who  have  blamed 
Pestalozzi  for  taking  part  in  the  work  of  the  Swiss 
Revolution,  and  treating  with  the  French  army 
which  fought  for  it.  We  know  of  nothing,  on  the 
contrary,  which  does  more  honour  to  Pestalozzi 


34  PESTALOZZI 

than  his  having  resolutely  joined  with  those  of  his 
compatriots  who  were  friends  of  progress,  and  conse- 
quently having  sided  with  France  and  the  Revolu- 
tion. At  this  period  he  was  at  heart  a  Frenchman. 
It  was  not  without  a  measure  of  patriotic  pride 
that  we  saw,  in  the  Pestalozzianum  at  Zurich,  one 
of  his  manuscripts,  an  Appel  aux  habitants  des  bords 
du  Lac,  signed:  "Pestalozzi,  citizen  of  Zurich  and 
citizen  of  France."  So  long  as  the  Revolution  aimed 
only  at  serving  the  cause  of  emancipation  of  the  peo- 
ple, Pestalozzi  remained  faithful  to  it.  In  the 
Helvetisches  Volkblatt,  a  newspaper  in  which  he 
wrote  before  settling  at  Stans,  he  addressed  eloquent 
discourses  to  his  fellow-citizens,  at  the  time  when 
France  asked  Switzerland  to  furnish  her  with  a 
contingent  of  eighteen  thousand  armed  auxiliaries: 
"O  my  native  land,  rejoice !  France,  the  great  na- 
tion, takes  thee  by  the  hand  in  a  passion  of  brotherly 
love.  ...  It  is  no  small  honour  to  go  and  learn  the 
profession  of  arms  beside  the  legions  of  Bonaparte, 
Jourdan,  and  Moreau,  and  to  train  yourselves  for 
the  service  of  your  fatherland  in  the  heroic  army 
of  the  French.  .  .  ."  It  was  not  till  later  that 
Pestalozzi's  affections  turned  from  France  when  he 
saw  its  generous  aspirations  followed  by  the  bloody 
dashes  across  Europe  and  the  ambitious  follies  of 
Napoleon's  despotism. 


PESTALOZZI  35 

The  material  settlement  at  Stans  was  of  the  most 
miserable  kind.  Pestalozzi  was  assisted  only  by  \ 
a  charwoman:  " I  myself  was  governor,  accountant, 
man-servant,  and  almost  maid-servant,  in  a  wreck 
of  a  house.77  The  workmen  were  engaged  in  putting 
the  refuge  to  rights,  with  the  orphans  already  in 
possession.  Pestalozzi  had  to  attend  to  a  thousand 
material  cares,  to  busy  himself  with  the  food  and 
clothing  of  all  this  little  company  of  eighty  children, 
of  whom  the  majority  were  confined  in  the  school. 
He  slept  in  their  midst;  he  cared  for  and  nursed 
them  with  a  mothers  tenderness.  He  surrounded 
them  with  his  love :  "It  was  necessary,77  said  he,  that 
from  morn  till  night,  these  poor  forsaken  ones  should 
feel  that  my  heart  was  with  them,  and  that  their 
happiness  was  mine.77  By  the  constant  influence 
of  his  presence  and  the  radiance  of  his  sympathy 
he  took  possession  of  these  little  souls.  "I  laughed 
and  cried  with  them.  .  .  ."  With  them  he  was  ill, 
in  a  refuge  which  was  less  a  school  than  a  children7s 
hospital:  "We  all  coughed,77  said  he,  "within  the 
damp  walls  of  a  newly  reconstructed  house,  and  in 
a  particularly  severe  winter.77 

In  a  long,  affecting  letter  addressed  to  his  Zurich 
friend,  the  bookseller  Gessner,  son  of  the  author 
of  Idylles,  Pestalozzi  recounted  the  means  which  he 
employed  to  begin  the  intellectual  and  moral  edu- 


36  PESTALOZZI 

cation  of  his  pupils  at  Stans.  One  word  sums  them 
up :  action.  He  acted  unceasingly.  He  spoke ;  he 
taxed  himself  unreservedly.  In  class,  he  went  from 
pupil  to  pupil,  encouraging  the  hard-working  and 
rebuking  the  idle.  An  extraordinary  animation, 
a  sustained  attention  on  the  part  of  the  pupils,  re- 
warded the  master's  efforts.  "They  had  the  desire, 
they  found  the  power,"  said  he;  "they  persevered; 
they  were  joyous.  They  felt  dormant  and  unknown 
forces  awakening  within  them."  The  tedium  which 
too  often  accompanies  study  had  disappeared  like 
a  shadow  from  the  school.  Those  who  visited 
Pestalozzi  at  Stans  bear  most  favourable  testimony 
to  the  progress  which  had  been  accomplished  in  a 
few  weeks:  "One  cannot  believe  one's  eyes,"  wrote 
Vicar  Businger.  "When  I  entered  the  class  room," 
said  Zschokke,  the  publicist,  in  his  turn,  "the  chil- 
dren were  so  engrossed  in  their  work  that  they  hardly 
lifted  their  heads."  Some  were  learning  letters  and 
figures ;  some  were  calculating,  others  were  drawing. 
The  only  master  for  rather  a  large  number  of  pupils, 
Pestalozzi  called  on  the  more  advanced  to  guide 
the  weaker  ones.  They  were,  added  Zschokke, 
grouped  in  threes ;  the  eldest,  placed  in  the  middle, 
put  his  arms  around  his  little  comrades'  necks,  the 
better  to  conduct  their  work.  It  was  a  beginning 
of  mutual  instruction.  Intellectual  exercises,  as  at 


PESTALOZZI  37 

Neuhof,  alternated  with  manual  labour.  In  short, 
the  results  came  up  to  Pestalozzi's  expectations. 
"I  was  convinced/7  said  he,  "that  my  heart  would 
correct  and  change  the  character  of  my  children 
by  the  time  the  spring  sun  came  and  revived  the 
earth  benumbed  by  winter.  And,  indeed,  before 
the  spring  had  melted  the  snow  on  our  mountains, 
my  pupils  were  no  longer  recognizable.  In  their 
angels7  eyes  and  their  transparent  glances,  I  saw 
the  progress  of  their  souls.  .  .  ."  What  Pestalozzi 
said  of  the  Pere  Girard  can  be  applied  to  himself: 
"The  Pere  Girard  works  miracles;  with  mud  he 
makes  gold.77 

The  course  of  events  abruptly  interrupted  Pesta- 
Iozzi7s  courageous  trial.  The  exigencies  of  the  war, 
which  had  begun  again,  required  that  the  orphans7  '•/ 
refuge  should  become  a  military  hospital.  The 
little  mountain  dwellers  had  to  make  room  for  sick 
and  wounded  soldiers.  The  experiment  had  lasted 
less  than  si?. months,  from  the  14th  of  January,  1799, 
to  the  8th  of  June  in  the  same  year.  Assuredly 
one  could  not  think  of  suggesting  it  as  a  model  for 
imitation,  any  more  than  it  would  be  possible  to 
make  general  the  ideal  education  invented  by  Rous- 
seau for  his  Emile.  The  "Stans  folly,77  as  it  has  been 
called,  though  it  was  a  reality,  should  only  be  con-  ;; 
sidered  as  a  hazardous  enterprise  upon  which  none 


OFTHE 

UNIVERSITY 

OF 


38  PESTALOZZI 

but  an  exceptional  man  may  venture.  Where  find 
another  Pebtalozzi,  animated  with  the  same  fer- 
vour? He  himself  could  not  have  long  continued 
such  an  effort.  Whilst  the  little  flock  prospered,  the 
shepherd,  indeed,  was  becoming  exhausted.  He  had 
reached  the  end  of  his  strength  and  was  spitting 
blood.  He  left  for  the  mountains,  for  the  heights 
of  Gurnigel,  grieved  to  see  his  work  interrupted, 
determined  to  take  it  up  again,  when  he  was  able, 
on  the  first  opportunity,  but  under  the  necessity 
of  restoring  his  strength  and  health,  in  the  complete 
repose  and  salubrious  air  of  the  high  mountains. 
It  was  from  the  height  of  Gurnigel  that  he  said, 
whilst  contemplating  the  vast  perspectives  and 
beautiful  scenery  of  the  valleys  of  Switzerland, 
stretching  away  into  the  distance  in  front  of  him: 
"I  admire  the  beauty  of  the  landscape,  but  I  think 
chiefly  of  the  poor  people  who  dwell  in  these  pictu- 
resque valleys,  of  those  who  suffer  there  from  bad 
instruction,  ignorance,  and  misery!" 

Roger  de  Guimps,  who  was  one  of  the  best  stu- 
dents and  most  observant  biographers  of  Pestalozzi, 
wrote,  after  he  had  journeyed,  about  1870,  through 
the  Aargau  countryside,  and  had  made  a  pilgrimage 
to  Neuhof:  "We  saw  no  poverty-stricken  people; 
everywhere  a  hard-working  and  prosperous  popula- 
tion, well-cultivated  lands,  and  good  schools.  .  .  . 


PESTALOZZI  39 

If  Pestalozzi  did  not  succeed  in  his  practical  attempts 
at  improving  the  people  of  these  parts,  the  prin- 
ciples which  inspired  his  enterprise  have  ended  by 
bearing  their  fruit.77  The  same  reflections  came  to 
us  when,  a  few  months  ago,  we  were  about  to  visit 
Stans  for  the  purpose  of  there  evoking  the  memory 
of  Pestalozzi's  passage.  In  this  retired  corner  of 
Switzerland,  where,  a  hundred  years  ago,  he  found 
the  ruins  of  the  civil  war  and  awakened  hatreds, 
where  he  was  ill-received  by  a  hostile  populace,  — 
he  who,  as  does  happen,  brought  liberty  in  the  guise 
of  oppression,  —  he  is  to-day  forgotten.  But  all 
is  gay  and  smiling  in  the  pretty  little  town  of  Stans, 
situated  a  few  miles  from  the  beautiful  Lake  Lucerne. 
The  inhabitants  seem  happy,  cured  of  all  hatred, 
and  quieted  in  republican  liberty.  All  around  the 
little  town  stretch  cultivated  fields  and  rich  pas- 
tures, strewn  with  enormous  apple  trees  and  vener- 
able pear  trees,  which  perchance  Pestalozzi  saw 
planted,  and  which  are  loaded  with  abundant  fruit 
each  year.  From  the  height  of  the  terrace  of  the 
Stanserhorn,  which,  from  its  altitude  of  6300  feet, 
dominates  the  plain  of  Stans  lying  at  its  feet,  whilst 
looking  at  this  pretty  white  village  in  its  setting  of 
verdure,  I  said  to  myself  that,  despite  appearances, 
men  such  as  Pestalozzi  do  not  pass  useless  through 
the  world;  that  human  thought  also  bears  its  fruit, 


40  PESTALOZZI 

since,  by  the  continuation  of  its  effort  and  with  the 
help  of  time,  it  succeeds  in  bringing  about  the  reign 
of  peace,  comfort,  and  happiness,  where  before  was 
only  fanaticism,  war,  and  misery ;  and  that  if  Pesta- 
lozzi  is  forgotten  at  Stans,  at  least  the  dreams  which 
he  conceived  for  the  happiness  of  humanity  are  in 
part  realized  in  this  corner  of  the  universe  as  else- 
where. 


IT  was  at  Burgdorf,  the  second  town  in  the  can- 
ton of  Berne,  that  teacher  Pestalozzi  was  called  again 
to  active  service,  some  months  after  the  closing  of 
the  orphanage  at  Stans.  And  to  speak  the  truth, 
this  was  the  only  time  that  he  was  truly  a  teacher 
in  the  proper  sense  of  the  word,  in  a  regular  school, 
and  had  a  class :  a  small  class,  however,  of  children 
of  both  sexes  not  yet  able  to  read.  He  found  that 
he  was  at  the  same  time,  as  he  said,  "the  most  subor- 
dinate of  masters,  and  the  reformer  of  education." 
And  for  a  year  he  occupied  himself,  a  humble  assist- 
ant master,  "in  pushing  the  modest  wheelbarrow 
of  the  A  B  C." 

I  do  not  know  whether  the  assistant  teacher  of 
the  infants'  class  at  Burgdorf,  if  visited  by  a  present- 
day  inspector,  would  have  obtained  from  him  a 
good  "Inspection  report."  I  fear  that  he  would 
have  been  unfavourably  commented  on  in  more  than 
one  respect :  thus  he  liberally  bestowed  boxes  on  the 
ear,  in  his  movements  of  impatience ;  he  spoke  very 
quickly  and  shouted  at  the  top  of  his  voice;  he  gave 

41 


42  PESTALOZZI 

scarcely  any  explanations  to  his  pupils,  and  con- 
fined himself  to  making  them  mechanically  repeat 
letters,  then  syllables  and  words.  He  did  not  fol- 
low a  regular  time-table.  But,  on  the  other  hand, 
how  can  we  refrain  from  admiring  the  devotion  and 
zeal  of  the  "celebrated  old  man,"  as  the  official 
reports  styled  him  already,  who,  still  young  under 
his  gray  hair,  strove  to  teach  the  alphabet  to  chil- 
dren of  from  five  to  eight  years  old  ?  The  inspectors 
of  that  time,  the  members  of  the  Berne  scholastic 
commission,  who  visited  the  school  in  July,  1800, 
after  only  eight  months'  work,  had  nothing  but 
praise  for  him:  "Your  pupils,"  they  said,  "have 
made  astonishing  progress ;  the  cleverest  are  already 
distinguishing  themselves  in  penmanship,  drawing, 
and  calculation.  .  .  .  You  have  shown  what  powers 
are  present  in  the  youngest  children,  and  the  means 
by  which  these  powers  can  and  should  be  developed." 
After  such  a  favourable  inspection,  Pestalozzi 
really  deserved  promotion,  and  he  obtained  it. 
From  the  infants7  class,  in  which  he  was  only  as- 
sistant, he  went  as  superintendent  to  the  "second 
boys'  school" ;  the  first  was  in  the  hands  of  a  teacher 
who'  at  the  same  time  carried  on  the  trade  of  shoe- 
maker, and  had  not  been  willing  to  authorize  Pesta- 
lozzi to  conduct  his  experiments  with  him.  Burg- 
dorf  castle  was  assigned  to  the  new  establishment. 


PESTALOZZI  43 

Almost  at  once,  however,  the  primary  school  was 
transformed  into  the  "Burgdorf  Educational  In- 
stitute/' a  composite,  mixed  establishment,  half 
school,  half  college,  of  which  Pestalozzi  took  con- 
trol, obtaining  the  cooperation  of  his  first  collabo- 
rators, Krusi,  Buss,  and  Tobler.1 

Hardly  had  it  begun,  when  the  longed-for  teacher's 
career  was  already  ended  for  Pestalozzi.  Hence- 
forth he  was  something  quite  different  from  what 
he  wished  to  be :  he  was  the  head  of  an  institution, 
the  superintendent  of  a  great  establishment  for 

1  Hermann  Krusi,  born  in  1775,  at  Gais,  in  the  canton  of 
Appenzell,  was  twenty-five  years  of  age  when  he  came  to  Burg- 
dorf  with  a  certain  number  of  Appenzell  children,  and  opened 
a  school  there.  Pestalozzi  obtained  his  cooperation  in  1800,  and 
thenceforward  Krusi  continued  his  collaboration.  We  tell  else- 
where how  he  became  a  teacher.  He  left  the  Yverdon  institute 
some  time  before  that  establishment  was  closed;  and,  after  Pesta- 
lozzi's  death,  he  became  superintendent,  first  of  a  cantonal  school 
at  Trogen,  and  later  of  a  normal  school  at  Gais.  At  Burgdorf 
and  Yverdon  he  was  principally  intrusted  with  the  language 
exercises  and  with  natural  history.  Roger  de  Guimps  pays  tribute 
to  his  moral  qualities.*  *He~died  in  1844. —  Buss  was  a  native  of 
Wiirttemberg.  It  was  Tobler  who  brought  him  to  Pestalozzi,  as 
a  specialist  in  drawing  and  singing.  —  Tobler  went  to  Burgdorf 
some  months  later  than  Buss.  He  was  born  in  Appenzell  in  1769. 
He  died  in  1843.  He  was  directing  a  poor  children's  school  at 
Bale,  when  his  friend  Krusi  sent  there  for  him  in  1800  and  per- 
suaded him  to  rejoin  Pestalozzi.  He  taught  geography  chiefly. 
He  left  Yverdon  long  before  the  dissolution  of  the  college,  and,  in 
1810,  he  had  already  founded  an  industrial  school  at  Mulhouse. 
He  afterwards  directed  other  establishments. 


44  PESTALOZZI 

secondary  education,  or  at  the  very  least  for  higher 
elementary  education;  he  had  a  boarding-school 
to  govern,  big  boys  to  instruct,  and  quite  a  body  of 
professors  to  direct.  What  cares  and  difficulties 
awaited  him  in  functions  for  which  he  knew  quite 
well  that  he  was  unsuited!  More  than  once  he 
thought  of  resigning,  of  becoming  a  teacher  once 
again,  and  of  leaving  what  he  called  his  "  galley- 
slave's  bench."  In  spite  of  all,  for  twenty-five  years 
he  devoted  himself  obstinately  to  his  task,  with 
varying  fortunes,  and  valiantly  bore  "a  burden 
which  overwhelmed  him."  He  resided  at  Burgdorf 
until  the  1st  of  July,  1804;  in  1804,  for  a  few  months 
at  Miinchenbuchsee,  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Hofwyl, 
where  Fellenberg,1  his  intermittent  friend,  continued 
his  philanthropic  attempts;  lastly,  at  Yverdon,  in 
the  canton  of  Vaud,  from  the  1st  of  July,  1805, 
till  1825.  "What  a  pity,"  wrote  the  Pere  Girard 
in  his  celebrated  Rapport  on  the  institution  at  Yver- 
don, "that  Pestalozzi  has  been  taken  away  from 

1  Fellenberg  (Emmanuel  de),  born  in  1771,  died  in  1844,  played 
a  great  part  in  the  history  of  Swiss  education.  He  is  the  pedagogue 
venerated  in  Berne,  as  is  the  Pere  Girard  in  Fribourg,  and  Pesta- 
lozzi in  Zurich  and  the  whole  of  Switzerland.  His  aim  was  analo- 
gous to  that  of  Pestalozzi,  whose  methods  he  rated  highly  in  spite 
of  the  very  lively  disagreements  which  he  had  with  him.  Like 
Pestalozzi,  in  his  Institut  agricole,  in  his  Institut  des  pauvres,  etc., 
he  wished  to  base  the  people's  education  on  the  combination  of 
manual  labour  with  instruction. 


PESTALOZZI  45 

the   career  which   he   chose   with   such   affection.  A 
The  primary  school,  the  model  of  all  the  others,  was 
then  nothing  but  a  vision  in  his  restless  and  labori-  k 
ous  life !  .  .    " 

This  was  just  what  Pestalozzi  himself  felt :  "  What 
I  desired  was  not  the  possession  of  an  establishment, 
it  was  the  consummation  of  my  method."  And, 
in  fact,  as  far  as  his  administrative  cares  permitted, 
he  did  not  cease  to  pursue  in  his  institutions  this 
intangible  " Method"  which  he  had  outlined  in  his 
books  and  made  trial  of  in  the  refuges,  the  orphanages 
and  the  schools,  without  having  as  yet  succeeded  in 
defining  it.  At  times  he  fancied  that  it  should  not 
be  restricted  to  childhood,  that  it  could  be  extended 
and  applied  to  the  more  advanced  studies  of  his  new 
pupils.  He  intrusted  to  his  collaborators  the  care 
of  its  elucidation,  by  preparing  practical  books,  in 
conformity  with  its  principles.  In  1803,  Krusi  and 
Buss  drew  up  E'rEeraces  tn/m^/s  sw  Zes  nom&res  and 
.Retraces  mimYx/s  sw  fes  /ormes  et  fes  grandeurs.  On 
his  part  Pestalozzi  had  written,  as  early  as  1801,  an 
Instruction  pour  apprendre  a  lire  et  a  epeler,  and  par- 
ticularly the  most  important  of  his  pedagogic  works, 
Comment  Gertrude  instruit  ses  enfants. 

The  success  of  the  institution  at  Burgdorf  added 
to  the  reputation  which  Pestalozzi  had  already 
made.  This  educational  establishment,  we  read  in 


46  PESTALOZZI 

an  official  document,  was  the  object  of  an  extraor- 
dinary infatuation.  It  was  eulogized  by  legions  of 
people.  The  number  of  pupils  did  not,  however, 
exceed  a  hundred.  Amongst  them  was  Ramsauer, 
of  Appenzell,  who  recounted  humorously,  and  not 
without  malice,  his  old  school-boy  memories.1 

About  the  year  1803,  fresh  collaborators  gathered 
round  the  master :  the  Alsatian  Neef  ;2  Barraud  from 
Vaud,  whom,  some  years  later,  Pestalozzi  had  to 
send  to  France,  at  the  request  of  Maine  de  Biran; 
Pfeiffer  the  musician ;  Muralt  the  theologian,3  who 
just  missed  being  the  teacher  of  Madame  de  StaePs 
children;  Pastor  Niederer,4  a  lettered  theologian, 

1  See  Ramsauer's  work :   Kurze  Skisse    meines  pddagogischen 
Lebens.     1838. 

2  Neef  was  chiefly  occupied  with  the  education  of  the  deaf  and 
dumb.     He  went  to  Paris  in  1803,  and  taught  there  for  a  time; 
then  he  went  to  the  United  States  and  settled  there. 

3  Muralt,  born  at  Zurich  in  1780,  was  Pestalozzi 's  collaborator 
from  1803  until  1810. 

4  Niederer,  like  Krusi   a  native  of  Appenzell,  had  from  afar 
conceived  an  admiration  for  Pestalozzi.     He  went  to  Burgdorf,  in 
1803,  to  superintend  the  religious  instruction  there.     In   1814, 
he  married  Rosette  Kasthofer,  the  teacher,  who,  since  1808,  had 
been  superintending  the  girls'  institution  attached  to  the  boys' 
institution.     Pestalozzi  called  him  "the  first  of  his  sons,"  but  he 
had  great  cause  to  complain  of  him,  and  finished  by  giving  the 
preference   to    Schmid.     In   the   last   years   of    Pestalozzi's    life, 
Niederer,  having  become  estranged  from  him,  founded  at  Yver- 
don  an  institution  for  girls,  which  prospered  and  which  he  trans- 
ferred to  Geneva  in  1837.     He  died  in  1843. 


PESTALOZZI  47 

who  scarcely  left  Pestalozzi  again,  and  lastly  Schmid, 
first  and  foremost  a  mathematician.1  The  scope  of 
the  teaching  was  enlarged,  thanks  to  these  numerous 
special  collaborations.  All  subjects  were  studied: 
chemistry,  algebra,  and  also  the  dead  languages. 
Pestalozzi  himself  tried  to  draw  up  Latin  exercises. 
But  the  pupils  became  noted  principally  for  their 
dexterity  in  drawing  and  in  mental  arithmetic;  \S 
and  in  this  the  influence  of  the  " Method"  declared 
itself.  The  discipline,  moreover,  was  liberal  and 
gentle:  "It  is  not  a  school  but  a  great  family  that 
I  see/7  exclaimed  a  visitor.  —  "Of  all  petty  tyrants," 
said  Pestalozzi,  "the  worst  are  school  tyrants;" 
and  he  wanted  no  tyrants,  either  small  or  great. 

It  was  not  of  his  own  free  will  that  Pestalozzi, 
in  1804,  gave  up  his  first  institution,  in  the  full  tide 
of  prosperity.  Political  happenings,  however,  dis- 
possessed him  of  Burgdorf  castle,  which  once  more 
became  what  it  was  before,  the  seat  of  the  public 
authorities  for  the  district.  This  is  still  its  function 
at  the  present  day.  We  recently  visited  Pesta- 
lozzi's  old  residence.  It  is  reached  by  a  difficult 

1  Joseph  Schmid,  the  chosen  of  Pestalozzi,  was  born  in  1786  in 
the  Tyrol.  Having  entered  Burgdorf  as  a  pupil  in  1801,  at  six- 
teen years  of  age,  he  made  such  rapid  progress  that,  two  years 
later,  he  was  capable  of  teaching  arithmetic.  "I  had,"  said  he, 
"found  in  Pestalozzi  a  second  father."  After  the  master's  death, 
he  settled  in  Paris,  where  he  died  in  1851.  Schmid  was  a  Catholic. 


48  PESTALOZZI 

path  which  follows  steep  slopes,  and  it  is  situated 
at  the  highest-lying  part  of  the  pretty  industrial 
town,  which  is  proud  of  its  Technikum,  a  school  for 
engineers,  electricians,  and  architects.  One  cannot 
help  thinking,  whilst  ascending  the  hard-paved 
road,  of  all  the  people  of  inquiring  mind  who  were 
attracted  to  it  a  century  ago  by  Pestalozzi's  grow- 
ing fame.  Herbart,  the  favourite  at  the  present  day 
of  Swiss,  German,  and  American  pedagogues,  visited 
it;  and  after  him  a  large  number  of  German  and 
Danish  educators,  who  came  to  make  themselves 
familiar  with  the  processes  of  the  Pestalozzian  method, 
the  majority  returning  captivated  and  convinced,  to 
spread  it  in  their  respective  countries.  Those  times 
are  distant.  I  entered  the  inner  courtyard  of  the 
castle,  lonely  and  silent.  On  a  wall  a  medallion  of 
Pestalozzi  may  be  seen,  and  beside  it  there  is  an 
inscription  in  German  to  inform  us  that  this  is  a 
token  of  gratitude,  dedicated  to  his  memory,  in 
1888,  by  the  town  of  Burgdorf .  Another  inscription 
calls  to  mind  that  Pestalozzi  uttered  "these  divine 
words":  "Love  your  brothers,  be  not  in  love  with 
yourself,"  and  that  they  are  taken  from  the  book 
which  he  composed  in  this  very  place,  Comment 
Gertrude,  etc.  This  is  all  that  remains  of  Pestalozzi 
in  Burgdorf.  From  the  inner  courtyard  of  the  castle 
a  superb  panorama  is  visible:  the  green,  industrial 


PESTALOZZI  49 

valley  of  the  Emmenthal;  nearer  at  hand,  thick 
forests,  escarpments,  and  rocks;  nearer  still,  the 
lower  town,  in  which  Pestalozzi  was  a  teacher.  The 
castle  itself  gives  an  impression  of  profound  melan- 
choly. I  look  closely,  and  see  barred  windows: 
I  even  seem  to  hear  smothered  groans.  This  is 
because  the  old  castle  is  a  prison.  By  a  curious  irony 
of  fate,  the  school  from  which  in  former  times  came 
words  of  confidence  in  human  dignity,  eloquent  ap- 
peals for  nobility  of  conscience  and  for  liberty  of 
existence,  is  now  a  place  of  detention  for  wrong-doers. 
At  the  precise  moment  that  I  cross  the  threshold 
on  leaving,  I  pass  a  constable  who  is  escorting  a 
prisoner,  a  vagabond  of  twenty  years  of  age.  The 
unhappy  man  is  going  to  be  isolated  in  a  cell.  Pes- 
talozzi, in  the  simplicity  of  his  candid  soul,  would 
have  received  him  very  differently,  with  words  of 
encouragement ;  he  would  doubtless  have  wished  to 
attempt  to  regenerate  him  also  by  instruction.  .  .  . 
Indeed,  was  it  not  thus,  or  nearly  so,  that  one  day 
he  addressed  a  criminal  who  was  about  to  be  con- 
fined in  a  prison  cell?  In  a  friendly  way  he  took 
his  hand,  slipped  a  coin  into  it,  and  said  to  him: 
"If  you  had  received  a  good  education,  you  would 
now  be  an  honest  man  and  a  useful  citizen.  It 
would  not  be  necessary  to  chain  you  up  like  a 
dog.  .  .  ." 


50  PESTALOZZI 

It  was  at  Yverdon,  even  more  than  at  Burgdorf, 
that  Pestalozzi  knew  the  delights  of  glory.  There 
he  had  moments  of  real  celebrity.  Pupils  flocked 
from  all  countries,  from  England,  Italy,  Spain,  and 
France  as  much  as  from  Switzerland  and  Germany. 
Some  were  refused  from  lack  of  space.  Yverdon 
became  a  cosmopolitan  college,  and  the  times  were 
heavy  with  ambition.  "We  were  told  that  the  eyes 
of  the  world  were  fixed  on  us/7  narrates  a  pupil. 
Visitors  were  so  numerous  as  to  interfere  with  the 
order  and  the  regularity  of  study.  In  the  eyes  of 
foreigners  Yverdon  Institute  was,  as  it  were,  one 
of  the  curiosities  of  Switzerland.  People  visited 
Pestalozzi  as  they  made  an  excursion  to  a  noted 
peak  or  a  glacier,  or  as  they  go  at  the  present  day 
to  Interlaken  or  Zermatt  to  admire  the  forces  of 
nature.  Pestalozzi  lent  himself  complaisantly  to 
these  exhibitions,  in  which  he  saw  a  means  of  propa- 
gating his  theories.  When  a  visitor  of  note  was 
announced,  he  at  once  sent  for  one  of  his  best  collab- 
orators: "Take  your  best  pupils,77  said  he  to  him, 
"and  show  what  they  know  best.77  They  applied 
themselves  to  displaying  the  institute  in  the  most 
favourable  light.  The  most  sincere  of  men  succumb 
at  times  to  the  temptation  of  a  certain  charlatanism. 
Their  excuse  is  that  they  are  seeking  the  triumph 
of  their  ideas.  "A  prince  is  coming  to  see  us,77 


PESTALOZZI  51 

said  Pestalozzi;  "he  is  the  master  of  a  great  number 
of  serfs ;  when  we  have  convinced  him  he  will  have 
them  educated." 

But  Pestalozzi  did  not  content  himself  with  the 
propaganda  carried  on  for  him  by  his  visitors: 
Madame  de  Stael,  Froebel,  Maine  de  Biran,  the  queen 
of  Wurttemberg,  to  mention  only  the  most  illustrious. 
He  did  not  shrink  from  any  exertion  to  evangelize 
the  world.  Thus,  in  1802,  with  an  official  mission, 
moreover,  as  a  member  of  the  Consulta  helvetique, 
he  journeyed  to  Paris,  nursing  the  secret  hope  of 
gaining  Bonaparte  himself  to  his  cause.  "Switzer- 
land is  too  small,"  said  he,  "for  what  I  would  wish 
to  be.  My  ideas  are  cosmopolitan."  But  his  recep- 
tion at  Paris  was  not  of  a  nature  to  encourage  him. 
"I  have  no  time  to  occupy  myself  with  questions  of 
ABC,"  declared  the  First  Consul,  plainly.  And 
Talleyrand,  who  a  little  later  was  present  at  a  prac- 
tical exhibition  of  the  Pestalozzian  method,  in  the 
class  held  by  Neef,  decided  disdainfully:  "It  is  too 
much  for  the  people  !"  Monge  also,  the  founder  of 
the  Polytechnic  School,  had  said,  "It  is  too  much 
for  us !"  Do  not  let  us  be  astonished,  after  this,  at 
the  severity  of  the  opinion  which  Pestalozzi  pro- 
nounced concerning  France :  "French  children  could 
be  made  into  the  finest  men  in  the  world,  if  they 
were  brought  up  by  German  hands.  French  women 


52  PESTALOZZI 

are  good,  but  the  men  are  worth  nothing!  .  .  ." 
Let  us  find  consolation  in  thinking  that  Pestalozzi 
had  judged  us  somewhat  hastily,  as  he  only  stayed 
a  few  weeks  in  Paris. 

Pestalozzi  always  looked  for  powerful  protectors. 
He  was  well  aware  that  the  individual  action  of 
a  few  enthusiastic  dreamers,  such  as  himself,  is  far 
from  being  sufficient  to  secure  the  success  of  the 
most  necessary  reforms,  that  the  support  of  govern- 
ments and  the  cooperation  of  legislators  is  essential. 
"I  am  looking  for  a  minister  who  is  a  man,"  he 
exclaimed.  He  thought  that  he  had  found  him, 
in  1808,  when  his  friend  Nicolovius,  having  become 
a  State  Councillor  and  one  of  the  directors  of  public 
education  in  Prussia,  informed  him  of  the  schemes 
for  reform  which  the  king  befriended :  "My  dream," 
cried  he,  "  shows  me  in  Frederick- William  the  hero 
of  love  as  opposed  to  the  heroes  of  war  1"  He  hung 
on,  if  I  may  use  the  expression,  to  all  the  sovereigns 
who  passed  near  him.  In  1814,  when  Czar  Alex- 
ander the  First  came  to  Bale,  Pestalozzi  hastened 
to  visit  him.  Without  hesitation,  he  asked  of  him 
the  emancipation  of  the  serfs  and  the  reform  of  the 
schools  in  Russia.  What  he  obtained  from  him 
was  a  cross,  the  Saint- Vladimir  decoration  of  the 
fourth  class.  In  the  same  year,  Frederick- William 
the  First,  king  of  Prussia,  passed  through  Neuchatel. 


PESTALOZZI  53 

Pestalozzi,  though  sick  and  feeble,  asked  audience 
of  him.  To  his  friends  who  wished  to  dissuade  him, 
he  replied:  "I  must  see  him,  though  it  kill  me! 
Should  my  visit  result  only  in  obtaining  a  better 
education  for  a  single  child,  I  shall  be  amply  rewarded 
for  my  trouble.  .  .  ." 

But  it  was  especially  in  the  organization  of  the 
studies  in  a  college  of  which  he  was  the  soul,  that 
Pestalozzi  displayed  all  the  efforts  of  his  activity. 
The  programme  of  a  school  day  at  Yverdon  was 
nearly  as  follows:  The  pupils  left  their  beds 
at  six  o'clock.  Pestalozzi,  however,  was  awake 
before  them,  and  he  was  known  to  summon 
the  masters  to  his  bedside  as  early  as  two  o'clock 
in  the  morning,  to  give  them  his  instructions. 
Having  got  up,  the  collegians  went  into  the 
courtyard,  and  there,  in  the  open  air,  washed 
in  cold  water  spurting  out  of  a  long  pipe, 
pierced  with  holes,  which  brought  the  water 
from  a  neighbouring  well.  Pestalozzi  began  the 
day  with  a  religious  or  moral  lecture,  in  presence 
of  the  professors  and  the  assembled  pupils  :Jtir^w&& 
the  happy  custom  which  in  our  times  Felix  Pecant 
has  so  brilliantly  reestablished  in  the  Normal  School 

None  of  the  lessons  lasted 


longer  than  an  hour.    They  were  varied  by  recrea- 
tion  and    walks  on  the  neighbouring  mountains. 


54  PESTALOZZI 

Manual  labour,  working  in  pasteboard  and  garden- 
ing, alternated  with  study.  Each  pupil  had  a  small 
.plot  of  ground  to  cultivate.  .Physical  training,  of 
which  Pestalozzi  hardly  ever  speaks,  was  not  neg- 
lected.1 Some  exercises  in  gymnastics  were  gone 
through.  In  the  evening,  from  seven  o'clock  till 
eight,  was  the  time  for  free  intellectual  work:  the 
pupils  worked  for  themselves,  wrote  letters,  or 
practised  drawing.  Singing  played  an  important 
part :  they  sang  all  the  time  and  everywhere,  in  the 
intervals  between  lessons,  at  play,  and  out  walking. 
The  masters  mixed  with  the  pupils  during  their 
games,  and  played  with  them.  There  were  neither 
punishments  nor  rewards.  Pestalozzi  did  not  wish 
for  either  rivalry  or  fear.  The  professors  went  to 
report  three  times  a  week.  Pestalozzi  frequently 
received  the  children  in  groups  of  five  or  six.  At 
times  he  stopped  them  in  the  corridors,  and  said  to 
them,  "And  you,  too,  don't  you  want  to  be  good 
and  well-behaved?'7  He  admitted  no  discipline 
other  than  that  of  duty,  or  rather  of  affection  and 
,  love.  He  was  not  a  master  to  his  pupils:  he 
was  " Father  Pestalozzi,"  and  they  all  were  his 
children. 


1  See  the  twentieth  letter  to  Greaves,  in  which  Pestalozzi  recom- 
mends gymnastics,  especially  from  the  point  of  view  of  their  moral 
utility. 


PESTALOZZI  55 

Such  a  regimen  very  nearly  approximated  to  that 
which  the  reformers  of  our  time  are  endeavouring 
to  introduce  into  some  new  foundations,  such  as  the 
"College  of  Normandy/'  or  the  "Des  Roches  School/' 
It  was  at  that  time  a  great  novelty,  and  there  is  no 
occasion  for  surprise  at  the  success  with  which  it 
met.  Side  by  side  with  brilliant  pages,  however, 
the  story  of  Yverdon  contains  many  painful  recitals. 
There  Pestalozzi  was  in  turn  the  most  celebrated 
and  acclaimed  of  educators,  and  the  most  decried 
and  vilified  of  men.  A  series  of  intrigues  were 
carried  on  around  him.  Wretched  quarrels  divided 
the  collaborators,  whose  cooperation  he  had  been 
obliged  to  obtain  for  special  subjects,  owing  to  the 
mediocrity  of  his  own  learning.  Undoubtedly  he 
had  had  the  good  fortune,  thanks  to  the  attraction 
which  he  exercised  over  the  minds  of  men,  to  obtain 
the  help  of  a  great  number  of  active,  intelligent 
young  men.  But  unfortunately  nearly  all  the  most 
distinguished  and  learned  of  these  professors  had  very 
bad  dispositions:  egotistical  and  absolute  in  their 
opinions,  if  they  possessed  the  knowledge  which  Pes- 
*  talozzi  lacked,  they  were  wanting  in  kindliness,  which 
constituted  his  power.  How  was  it  possible  to  suc- 
ceed in  conciliating  and  keeping  united  masters  who, 
to  begin  with,  differed  in  nationality  and  in  racial 
characteristics,  —  there  were,  at  Yverdon,  Germans, 


56  PESTALOZZI 

Frenchmen,  and  Italians,  —  and  who  also  differed 
in  their  aims?  How  was  it  possible,  for  example, 
to  make  the  idealistic  theologian  Niederer  work  in 
harmony  with  the  realistic  mathematician  Schmid? 
To  succeed  in  this  would  have  required  the  energetic 
control  of  an  administrator  like  Fellenberg,  whom 
Pestalozzi  called  "the  man  of  iron,"  a  tact  and 
skill  which,  being  entirely  without  it,  he  did  not 
employ. 

Hence  a  series  of  internal  dissensions,  quarrels 
followed  by  reconciliations,  departures  and  returns. 
There  was  a  perpetual  coming  and  going  of  profess- 
ors who  could  not  manage  to  agree,  and  who,  after 
abusing  each  other,  abused  the  master  himself. 
The  conflict  was  incessant.  Pestalozzi  was  con- 
tinually obliged  to  intervene  in  order  to  restore 
peace,  a  precarious  and  temporary  peace  at  that. 
He  addressed  pathetic  speeches,  interrupted  by  sobs, 
to  his  collaborators.  He  asked  pity  for  himself: 
"I  entreat  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Niederer/7  wrote  he,  "to 
spare  me  the  martyrdom  which  I  have  suffered 
for  six  years."  At  times,  worn  out,  his  patience  at 
an  end,  he  escaped  from  this  "hell,"  and  took 
refuge  alone  in  the  mountains,  at  Bullet,  where 
he  composed  verses  of  melancholy  resignation: 
"In  days  of  tempest,  God  strengthened  me,  .  .  . 
etc." 


PESTALOZZI  57 

He  was,  in  addition,  attacked  from  without.1 
In  every  time  and  country,  fanatics  have  been  found 
to  decry  innovators.  He  was  accused  of  counte- 
nancing anti-Christian  doctrines.  Did  he  not  dare 
to  write  that  "man  can  do  all  things,  that  his  will 
is  enough,  and  that  he  should  rely  on  himself  alone  "  ? 
Those  of  his  colleagues  who  had  remained  ortho- 
dox Protestants  were  the  first  to  cast  stones  at 
him.2 

Yet  he  was  religious;  he  had  a  pious  mind:  "I 
recognize  the  hand  of  God/7  he  said,  whenever  any- 
thing auspicious  happened  to  him.  But  he  was  not 
forgiven  for  contenting  himself  with  natural  religion,  (/ 
with  a  philosophic  deism  such  as  Rousseau  professed, 
and  with  a  rational  Christianity.  "The  mystery 

1  Among  his  most  violent  detractors  must  be  mentioned  an 
Englishman,  Biber,  who  had  been  employed  for  some  time  in  the 
institute.    He  published,  in  1827,  a  veritable  pamphlet  against 
Pestalozzi,  an  "  impious  book/'  said  M.  Guillaume,  in  which  Pes- 
talozzi  was  described  as    a  "  charlatan "   and    a  "  hypocrite " : 
Beitrag  zur  Biographie  Pestalozzis.    In  addition  to  this  German 
work,  Biber  published,  in  1831,  a  book  entitled :  H.  Pestalozzi  and 
his  plan  of  Education,  which  we  would  not  have  mentioned,  if  we 
had  not  recently  learned  from  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer  himself , — who 
nevertheless  most  accurately  appreciated  the  strength  and  the 
weakness  of  the  Pestalozzian  method,  —  that  it  was  through  this 
book  alone  that  he  knew  Pestalozzi. 

2  Several  books  have  been  written  in  Germany  on  PestalozzFs 
religious  ideas.     See  Burkart,  H.  Pestalozzi  etait-il  un  incredule  f 
Leipzic,  1841 ;  —  Heer,  Sur  la  methode  de  Pestalozzi  consider  ee  comme 
lefordement  d'une  education  chretienne.    Zurich,  1870. 


58  PESTALOZZI 

of  the  Trinity,"  he  said,  "is  not  in  the  Bible, — 
Jesus  is  simply  the  greatest  of  men." 

Pestalozzi's  sensitive  soul  suffered  cruelly  from 
all  these  troubles.  In  vain  did  he  cry  out:  "I  am 
master  in  my  own  house."  The  poor  man,  in  propor- 
tion as  he  aged,  grew  weaker  and  more  irritable,  and 
became  more  and  more  the  plaything  and  dupe  of 
his  associates.  In  1820,  he  could  still  delude  himself ; 
he  exclaimed:  "I  feel  happy  now.  .  .  .  Praise  be 
to  God !  All  goes  well.  The  evening  of  my  life  is 
peaceful  and  serene.  .  .  ."  This  did  not  last. 
The  decay  of  the  institution  began  about  1824, 
\J  and  became  ever  more  rapid.  The  pupils  lessened 
in  number.  His  most  faithful  friends  deserted  him. 
Jealous  of  Schmid,  who,  from  1815,  reigned  as  master, 
Niederer  and  Krusi  established,  in  Yverdon  itself, 
rival  schools  in  which  they  claimed  to  inherit  the 
Pestalozzian  spirit,  which,  according  to  them,  was 
with  Pestalozzi  no  longer.  In  addition  to  this 
the  State  Council  of  the  canton  of  Vaud  demanded 
the  dismissal  of  Schmid,  from  whom  Pestalozzi  did 
not  wish  to  be  separated.  At  last,  wearied  and 
discouraged,  the  good  old  man  resigned  himself  to 
a  fresh  renunciation,  and  left  Yverdon  for  good 
on  the  2d  of  March,  1826.  "It  was,"  said  he,  "as 
though  I  were  putting  an  end  to  my  life,  so  much 
did  this  separation  pain  me !" 


PESTALOZZI  59 

He  had  lived  there  for  twenty  years.  And, 
whatever  he  himself  may  have  thought,  it  was  there 
that  he  reached  the  height  of  his  glory.  "My  in- 
stitute, as  born  from  the  womb  of  chaos  at  Burgdorf, 
as  it  existed  at  Yverdon  in  a  deformity  for  which 
no  words  serve,  was  not  my  life's  ambition."  He 
continued  to  dream  of  a  humble  village  school,  with 
the  infants.1  It  is  none  the  less  true  that  the  ad- 
ministration of  the  college  at  Yverdon  remains,  in 
the  eyes  of  an  equitable  posterity,  one  of  the  chief 
claims  which  Pestalozzi's  pedagogic  activity  has 
to  distinction. 

It  was  at  Yverdon  that  Switzerland  raised,  in 
1888,  the  finest  of  the  monuments  which  she  has 
dedicated  to  him.  We  recently  made  our  reverence 
to  this  statue,  which  is  the  ornament  of  Pestalozzi 
Place,  quite  near  to  the  old  castle  where  he  used  up 
his  declining  years  in  the  service  of  education.  He 
is  represented  standing,  energetic  and  gentle,  with 
a  well-tied  cravat,  such  as  he  never  wore :  for,  as 
is  known,  nothing  was  more  neglected  than  his  dress. 

1  The  best  proof  that  can  be  given  of  the  interest  which  Pesta- 
lozzi did  not  cease  to  take  in  primary  education  is  the  creation  of 
the  normal  school,  organized  by  him,  in  1818,  at  Clindy,  a  suburb 
of  Yverdon.  This  institution,  which  was  to  be  paid  for  from  the 
Cotta  subscription  money,  took  in  twelve  poor  children,  boys  and 
girls,  who  were  prepared  there  for  the  profession  of  teaching;  it 
is  deserving  of  a  special  study. 


60  PESTALOZZI 

Near  him,  two  children,  a  girl  and  a  boy,  are  listen- 
ing to  him.  He  is  pointing  out  to  them  the  way 
to  the  school,  Yverdon  castle,  which  remains  the 
seat  of  the  primary  schools  of  the  town,  with  their 
twenty-two  classes  and  their  thousand  pupils.  The 
secondary  education  is  conducted  on  other  premises, 
in  a  college  which  is  a  veritable  palace  and  bears  on 
its  fagade,  written  in  large  letters,  the  names  of 
Pestalozzi  and  some  of  his  pupils,  Roger  de  Guimps, 
Vuillemin,  etc.  Rousseau's  name  might  also  have 
been  written  there. 

We  like  to  couple  Pestalozzi  with  Rousseau,  for 
we  see  in  them  two  heroes  of  modern  education. 
Brothers  in  origin,  the  citizen  of  Geneva  and  the 
citizen  of  Zurich  are  also  brothers  in  feeling  and  in 
their  aspirations  towards  better  education.  But 
at  Yverdon  the  comparison  is  singularly  striking. 
It  was  in  fact  to  Yverdon,  in  that  delightful  country 
whose  beauty  he  has  so  highly  praised,  that  Rous- 
seau, in  1762,  forty  years  before  Pestalozzi  arrived 
there,  sadly  came  to  live  through  the  first  days  of 
his  exile,  after  the  condemnation  of  Emile  by  the 
Parliament  of  Paris.  It  was  of  Yverdon  that  he 
wrote:  "I  am  going  to  wander  among  these  moun- 
tains, until  I  find  a  refuge  wild  enough  for  me  to 
spend  there  in  peace  the  remainder  of  my  wretched 
days."  It  was  from  Yverdon,  where  he  had  thought 


PESTALOZZI  61 

to  set  foot  in  "a  land  of  justice  and  liberty/'  that  he 
was  expelled,  some  weeks  later,  by  the  retrograde 
government  of  Berne,  and  was  compelled  to  go  for 
hospitality  to  the  king  of  Prussia.  And  it  was  to 
Yverdon  that  the  government,  transformed  by  the 
revolution  of  1798,  summoned  Pestalozzi  to  continue, 
in  practical  form,  Rousseau's  theoretical  work. 
So  that,  in  the  space  of  half  a  century,  the  same  town 
sheltered  them  both ;  it  witnessed  the  passage  of  the 
unhappy  outlaw,  embittered  and  irritated  by  per- 
secution, and  then  it  welcomed  Rousseau's  disciple, 
full  of  ardour  and  courage,  who  also  was  working  for 
the  education  of  humanity. 

Sad  and  poor,  Pestalozzi,  in  his  turn,  left  Yver- 
don and  retrod  the  road  to  Neuhof.  Schmid,  his 
inseparable,  his  alter  ego,  having  at  least  the  merit 
of  fidelity,  accompanied  him  in  his  retirement. 
With  pleasure  he  saw  once  more  his  chosen  place  of 
abode,  where  he  had  cherished  his  first  schemes  for 
the  intellectual  emancipation  of  the  poor.  Incor- 
rigible in  his  hopes,  he  still  had  thoughts  of  founding 
a  boys'  school  there.  But  death  was  drawing  nigh. 
.  .  .  "Soon  shall  I  see  the  celestial  light,"  said  he. 
A  few  tokens  of  public  recognition  softened  the 
melancholy  of  his  last  days.  Life  dealt  harshly  with 
him,  but  posterity  is  kind,  and  its  kindness  seems  to 
have  begun  for  him  before  he  closed  his  eyes  forever. 


62  PESTALOZZI 

In  1825,  he  was  enthusiastically  welcomed  by  the 
annual  assembly  of  the  Swiss  Society,  of  which  for 
twenty-nine  years  he  had  been  a  member:  he  was 
acclaimed  president  for  the  following  year.  In 
1826,  he  visited  an  orphanage,  where  the  children 
presented  him  with  a  wreath  of  oak.  To  the  very 
end,  however,  vexations  were  not  spared  him.  On  his 
death-bed  he  had  to  endure  the  insults  of  Fellenberg, 
who  dared  to  reproach  this  most  disinterested  of  men 
with  having  appropriated  the  funds  from  the  sub- 
scriptions received  for  the  first  complete  edition  of 
his  works,  Cotta's  edition ;  and  also  the  odious  abuse 
of  Biber's  pamphlet,  which  appeared  in  1827:  "I 
must  live  for  six  weeks  longer,"  exclaimed  the  dying 
man,  "that  I  may  answer  these  base  calumnies!" 
But  his  strength  forsook  him.  He  had  overtaxed 
his  robust  constitution,  which  he  delighted  to  char- 
acterize in  these  words:  "I  have  the  health  of  a 
bear;"  and  on  the  17th  of  February,  1827,  he  ex- 
pired peacefully,  saying:  "I  die  without  regret. 
I  forgive  my  enemies  and  bless  my  friends.  .  .  ." 
At  Birr,  thirty  men  and  thirty  women,  no  more, 
followed  the  funeral  procession  of  one  of  Switzer- 
land's most  illustrious  children. 


VI 

THE  story  of  Pestalozzi's  life,  as  has  just  been 
seen,  is  interwoven  with  his  practical  education  work. 
It  reveals  to  us  in  all  their  splendour  the  high  moral 
qualities  with  which  he  was  endowed.  It  shows, 
throughout  the  vicissitudes  of  a  long,  wandering, 
agitated  existence,  a  perpetual  striving  towards  the 
final  establishment  of  a  method  of  instruction  and 
education  for  the  people. 

What  was  this  method  ?  There  is,  let  us  confess, 
considerable  difficulty  in  defining  it.  Some  critics 
have  got  over  this  difficulty,  somewhat  lightly,  by 
saying  that  Pestalozzi  had  none.  The  fact  is  that 
he  himself  did  not  succeed  in  expressing  it  by  settled 
formulas.  It  remained  vague  and  uncertain  in 
a  brain  which,  in  its  state  of  ferment,  was  fitter 
for  passionate  conception  than  for  the  arrangement 
of  abstract  thought.  Destutt  de  Tracy  wrote,  in 
1807,  to  Maine  de  Biran,  that  he  suspected  that 
"the  method  of  which  there  was  so  much  talk  was 
not  yet  properly  unravelled  inthemind  of  its  author." 
This  was  perfectly  true.  Pestalozzi  made  deep  re- 


64  PESTALOZZI 

search  but  arrived  at  no  conclusion.  He  conceived 
great  things  and  started  off  to  accomplish  them; 
he  strove  hard  and  overtaxed  himself  to  carry  them 
into  execution,  but  he  did  not  succeed.  The  truth 
is  that  his  work  was  left  unfinished.  "His  theories/' 
said  Steinmuller,  in  1803, ' i  followed  his  experiments ; " 
and  as  he  experimented  throughout  his  life,  his 
theories  varied.  In  1817,  in  a  letter  to  Niederer, 
he  spoke  of  the  " elaboration  of  his  method'7:  this 
was  an  admission  that  at  this  date  it  was  not  yet 
settled.  In  1820,  he  rejected  as  immature  the  ideas 
which  he  had  set  forth,  in  1801,  in  his  Lettres  a 
Gessner*  The  confusion  is  increased  by  the  fact 
that  his  commentators,  profiting  from  what  inde- 
cision there  is  in  his  thought,  have  often  interpreted 
it  according  to  their  own  ideas :  they  have  disfigured, 
distorted,  and  even  obscured  it.  One  recalls  what 
an  Yverdon  scholar,  the  historian  Vuillemin,  said 
concerning  it  in  his  Souvenirs,  written,  however, 
fifty  years  later:  "What  went  by  the  name  of  Pes- 
talozzi's  'Method'  was  an  enigma  to  us.  It  was 
an  enigma  to  our  professors  themselves.  Like  the 
disciples  of  Socrates,  each  understood  the  master's 

1  We  say  Lettres  a  Gessner  for  brevity.  The  correct  title  of  the 
work  is  Wie  Gertrud  ihre  Kinder  lehrt.  Gertrude,  the  heroine  of  the 
novel  Leonard,  does  not,  however,  appear  in  the  book.  She  became 
the  symbolic  name  which  represents  the  perfect  mother  and  ideal 
teacher  as  conceived  by  Pestalozzi. 


PESTALOZZI  65 

doctrine  in  his  own  way ;  and  a  day  came  when,  after 
each  had  given  himself  out  as  the  only  one  who  had 
understood  Pestalozzi,  they  all  finished  by  declaring 
that  Pestalozzi  had  not  understood  himself." 

It  is  not  impossible,  however,  to  distinguish, 
through  the  various  and  at  times  contradictory 
processes  which  he  tried  in  turn,  the  essential  char- 
acteristics of  the  method  which  he  wished  to  insti- 
tute, and  the  dominant  ideas  which  governed  his 
teaching  and  composed  the  unity  of  his  pedagogic 
life.  Disciples  have  even  been  found  intrepid 
enough  to  undertake  the  task  of  a  systematic  clas- 
sification of  Pestalozzi's  ideas,  a  labour  hardly 
warranted  by  his  impulsive  and  changing  genius. 
Jullien,1  in  his  Expose  de  la  Methode,  a  crude  and 
ponderous  work,  distinguishes  in  it  as  many  as  twelve 
fundamental  principles,  and  also  twelve  essential 
characteristics,  neither  more  nor  less.  The  model 
is  distorted  and  the  original  travestied  by  the  claim, 

1  Jullien  (Marc-Antoine),  called  Jullien  of  Paris,  son  of  the 
Member  of  the  National  Convention,  Jullien  of  Dr6me,  went  to 
Yverdon,  in  1810,  and  stayed  there  for  some  months.  He  had 
played  a  part  in  military  and  political  affairs  under  the  orders  of 
Bonaparte,  from  whom  he  seceded  on  the  18th  Brumaire.  At 
a  later  date  he  was  again  taken  into  favour  and  was  intrusted  with 
missions  in  Italy:  it  was  during  one  of  these  missions  that  he 
visited  Pestalozzi's  institute.  It  was  Jullien  who  founded,  under 
the  Restoration,  le  Constitutionel  newspaper.  He  took  a  rather  active 
part  in  the  July  revolution. 


66  PESTALOZZI 

with  this  analytical  excess  and  profusion  of  divisions, 
to  imprison  and  catalogue  in  hard  and  fast  formulas 
the  varied  inspirations  of  a  mind  which  was  always 
in  motion  and  which  could  never  come  to  a  final  de- 
cision. 

\  There  is  one  ruling  idea  which  must  at  the  out- 
;  set  be  insisted  upon:  this  is  the  idea  of  intuition 
(Anschauung),  considered  as  the  starting-point  of 
all  knowledge,  and  consequently  as  the  basis  of  all 
instruction.  We  should  approach  the  truth  very 
nearly,  if  we  defined  Pestalozzi  as  "the  pedagogue 
of  intuition."  —  "What  have  I  done,"  said  he, 
"that  is  my  personal  work?  I  laid  down  the  higher 
principle  ruling  the  science  of  education,  on  the  day 
when  I  recognized  in  intuition  the  absolute  prin- 
ciple of  all  knowledge."  It  is  true  that  Comenius 
and  Basedow,  before  him,  had  perceived  the  same 
truth  and  attempted  to  apply  it. 

What,  then,  is  intuition  ?  It  is  not  only  the  exter- 
nal perception  of  the  senses.  Intuition  extends  to 
the  experiences  of  the  inner  consciousness,  to  senti- 
ment and  emotion  as  much  as  to  sensation.  "In- 
tuition is  the  immediate  impression  which  the  physi- 
cal and  moral  worlds  produce  on  our  external  and 
internal  senses."  Intuition  is  direct  personal  ex- 
perience; and  if  sensible  perceptions  should  form 
the  foundation  of  intellectual  education,  moral 


PESTALOZZI  67 

perceptions,  sentiments  of  love,  confidence,  and  grati- 
tude, early  developed  in  the  child's  conscience,  will 
become  the  firm  and  sure  support  of  his  moral  edu- 
cation. 

Let  us  clearly  understand  Pestalozzi's  thought. 
Too  often  the  common  instruction  presents  to  the 
child,  at  the  very  outset  of  his  studies,  abstract 
and  general  notions,  which  do  not  correspond  to 
anything  in  his  experience.  He  is  told  of  rivers 
and  oceans,  without  having  seen  even  a  pond  or 
a  brook;  of  mountains  and  river  basins,  without 
having  climbed  even  a  hillock.  He  is  taught  the 
great  words  duty  and  virtue,  without  first  having  the 
moral  sentiments  awakened  in  his  heart.  Thus  is 
the  edifice  raised  upon  the  sand.  An  unploughed 
field  is  sown ;  or,  indeed,  scraps  of  knowledge  which 
cannot  lodge  and  take  root  in  the  mind  are  laid,  as 
it  were,  on  the  surface  of  a  fragile  memory.  They 
are  like  signboards  which,  lightly  fastened  to  an 
insecure  and  badly  made  wall,  are  carried  away 
by  the  first  breath  of  wind. 

It  was  this  superficial  instruction  of  the  old 
"Gothic  and  monastic''  schools  that  Pestalozzi 
wished  to  sweep  away.  Close  those  schools  in  which 
the  master  alone,  or  indeed  the  book,  acts,  and 
open,  instead,  the  school  in  which  the  child,  invited 
to  make  use  of  his  senses  and  exercise  his  conscious- 


68  PESTALOZZI 

ness,  finds  in  himself  the  principle  of  his  activity, 
the  support  of  his  intellectual  and  moral  develop- 
ment, and  the  seed  from  which,  by  a  progressive 
evolution,  the  human  personality  issues,  educated, 
enlightened,  and  virtuous,  like  a  living  organism, 
in  the  same  way  that  the  tree  issues  from  the  acorn. 
Intuition  alone  can  plant  this  seed  in  the  mind. 
-And  that  is  why  Pestalozzi,  discarding  books  and 
suppressing  the  abuse  of  didactic  lessons,  aspires  to 
placing  the  child  in  the  presence  of  the  things.  "Do 
not  cast  him  into  the  labyrinth  of  words,  before 
forming  his  mind  by  a  knowledge  of  realities."  — 
"The  child  requires  no  intermediary  between  nature 
and  himself."  He  often  repeated,  "Nature  does 
everything.77 

Let  it  not  be  imagined,  however,  that  Pestalozzi 
put  his  trust  in  the  natural  tuitions,  as  offered  to  us 
by  our  senses  and  our  consciousness,  in  their  com- 
plexity and  crudity.  They  must  come  to  maturity 
as  the  result  of  a  slow  analysis.  A  phrase  which  is 
constantly  recurring,  like  a  refrain,  in  the  Lettres  a 
Gessner  is  that  it  is  a  question  of  leading  the  child 
< "  from  confused  intuition  to  clear  perception,7'  that 
he  must  be  raised  "from  vague  intuition  to  precise 
idea.77  What  does  this  mean,  if  not  that  nature's 
education  is  insufficient,  that  primitive  intuition 
needs  elucidation  and  analysis,  in  short  that  there 


PESTALOZZI  69 

is  an  "art  of  intuition "?  And  this  art  consists  in 
organizing  a  series  of  methodically  arranged  exer- 
cises, which  are  brought  to  the  child's  attention 
one  after  the  other. 

How  should  these  exercises  be  arranged  ?  Accord- 
ing to  a  principle  clearly  laid  down  by  Pestalozzi  and 
developed  by  Herbart,  the  principle  of  "gradation/' 
or,  if  you  will,  of  "concentration.77  Let  us  distrust 
the  parcelling  out  which  is  too  much  practised  in 
ordinary  studies  and  in  lessons  in  which  incoherent 
notions  having  no  mutual  connection  are  juxta- 
posed without  any  order,  like  ill-fitting  pieces  of 
a  badly  adjusted  mosaic.  Just  as  knowledge  re- 
quires a  fulcrum,  which  is  supplied  by  intuition, 
so  it  needs  connection  and  an  order  of  development, 
and  in  this  the  method  consists.  The  various  no- 
tions which  compose  elementary  education  are  offered 
to  the  child  "in  continuous,  unbroken  succession.77 
To  each  intuition  are  joined,  as  to  a  parent  idea, 
all  the  facts  which  belong  to  the  same  class  of  ideas. 
There  is  never  any  lack  of  continuity  between  the 
studies  of  one  day  and  the  next.  Care  is  taken, 
however  —  and  this  is  a  point  to  which  Pestalozzi 
insistently  returns  —  to  keep  back  the  pupil  on  each 
exercise,  with  calculated  deliberation,  until  he  has 
thoroughly  mastered  it.  He  is  only  permitted  to 
take  a  step  forward,  to  advance  a  little  farther,  when 


70  PESTALOZZI 

he  has  firmly  assured  his  progress  on  the  ground 
already  traversed.  Nothing  is  more  at  variance 
with  a  good  educational  method  than  too  rapid 
a  passage  from  one  study  to  another,  without  being 
sure  that  the  preceding  knowledge  is  completely 
acquired,  and  that  it  makes  the  knowledge  which 
follows  both  possible  and  easy.  "  Everything  that 
is  not  perfect  in  the  germ  will  be  abortive  in  its 
growth."  Moreover,  it  is  a  great  evil,  in  education, 
to  be  satisfied  with  less  than  "  quite  " ;  and  it  is  impor- 
tant to  accustom  a  child  to  doing  well  whatever  he 
does,  so  that  he  "may  aim  at  perfection."  Madame 
de  Stael  said,  " There  is  no  ' almost '  in  Pestalozzi's 
method." 

In  the  gradation  and  disposition  of  the  exercises 
which  he  recommends  for  making  first  intuitions 
bear  fruit,  Pestalozzi  claims,  moreover,  to  follow 
nature's  order.  Now  nature  wills  us  to  go,  not 
from  the  simple  to  the  compound,  —  which  is  an 
equivocal  and  highly  debatable  statement,  —  but 
from  the  nearer  to  the  more  remote,  which  is  a  much 
clearer  recommendation.  A  child's  observation 
should  radiate  from  what  he  touches  and  sees  around 
him,  to  what  is  situated  in  the  neighbourhood,  and 
gradually  to  more  distant  objects.  "Knowledge 
begins  around  man,  and  thence  extends  in  ever 
widening  circles." 


PESTALOZZI  71 

In  order  to  give  at  once  an  example  of  the  applica- 
tion  of  this  principle,  let  us  draw  attention  to  the 
exercises  on  intuition  and  language,  which,  in  the 
Manuel  des  Meres,1  Pestalozzi  —  or  rather  his 
disciple,  Krusi,  who  drew  up  three-quarters  of  this 
little  volume  —  proposed  for  the  pupils  of  the  in- 
stitute at  Burgdorf.  /There  is  nothing  nearer  us 
than  our  own  body.  A  child  must  then,  before  all 
else,  be  trained  to  know,  and  to  be  able  to  name,  all 
the  parts  of  his  body.|  Did  not  Jean  Mace,  when 
writing  the  Histoire  d'une  bouchee  de  pain,  draw 
inspiration  from  Pestalozzi's  idea  ?  The  pupil  must, 
as  in  a  litany,  mention  in  detail  the  lips,  the  bones  of 
the  lower  lip,  the  bones  of  the  upper  lip,  the  mouth, 
the  corners  of  the  mouth,  the  right  corner  of  the 
mouth,  etc.  Certainly  these  exercises  in  language  ex- 
pose themselves  to  ridicule:  they  occupy  more  than 
fifty  pages.  The  French  critic,  Dussaulx,  said  hu- 
morously, "Pestalozzi  takes  great  pains  to  teach  his 
pupils  that  their  nose  is  in  the  middle  of  their  face  I" 

The  idea,  stripped  of  the  grotesque  childishness 
in  which  it  pleased  Krusi  to  envelop  it,  is,  never- 
theless, not  to  be  disdained  in  itself.  Maine  de 
Biran  praised  Pestalozzi  for  this  very  desire  to  begin 
the  development  of  the  child's  intuitive  and  reason- 

1  The  Manuel  des  Meres,  published  in  1803,  was  translated  into 
French  in  1821. 


72  PESTALOZZI 

ing  faculties  by  a  descriptive  analysis  of  the  object 
nearest  to  it,  and  most  interesting  for  it  to  know; 
that  is,  the  human  body.  And  especially  is  it  of 
importance  to  observe  how,  in  the  portions  of  the 
book  which  he  wrote,  Pestalozzi  ingeniously  unites 
with  the  enumeration  of  each  of  our  organs  the  study 
of  their  functions;  and  how  the  analysis  of  these 
functions  itself  leads  to  a  series  of  useful  observa- 
tions concerning  the  objects  with  which  our  organs 
put  us  in  communication,  with  men,  animals,  and 
plants,  with  everything  that  can  be  seen  or  heard. 
In  a  phrase  which  is,  as  it  were,  the  rapid  recapitu- 
lation of  all  his  pedagogics,  Pestalozzi  wrote:  "For 
each  branch  of  knowledge  there  should  be  series 
of  exercises  having  their  starting-point  within  reach 
of  all  (intuition),  and  with  a  regular  sequence  (gra- 
dation), which  would  keep  the  child's  faculties  con- 
stantly at  work,  without  exhausting  or  even  tiring 
them,  and  would  contribute  to  continuous,  easy, 
and  attractive  progress."  Everything  essential  in 
the  Pestalozzian  method  is  contained  in  these  few 
lines:  the  principle  of  intuition,  that  of  rigorous 
connection  between  successive  teachings;  and  also 
two  other  principles  of  which  we  have  yet  to  speak, 
which,  moreover,  depend  on  those  already  mentioned ; 
namely,  that  there  is  no  other  good  method  of 
education  than  that  which  trains  the  activity,  and 


PESTALOZZI  73 

that  which,  as  a  natural  consequence,  excites  the 
interest. 

The  extension  of  positive  knowledge  is  of  less 
importance  than  the  intensive  development  of  the 
faculties,  strengthened  and  enlarged  by  exercise. 
Intellectual  growth,  indeed,  depends  on  exercise 
and  continued  action.  "Nature,"  said  Pestalozzi, 
in  the  Soiree  d'un  ermite,  as  early  as  1780,  "  nature 
develops  all  the  forces  of  humanity  by  exercise,  and 
their  growth  proceeds  from  their  use."  It  is  neces- 
sary for  the  child  to  act,  for  his  eyes,  his  voice,  and 
also  his  hands  to  be  constantly  occupied.  No  more 
sluggish  reading  then,  or  long,  mechanical  recitations. 
No  more  of  those  sleepy,  half-dead  classes,  in  which 
a  routine-bound  master  dictates  or  expounds  his 
knowledge  to  poor  patients,  who  content  themselves 
with  submitting  to  monotonous  lessons,  with  more 
or  less  wandering  attention,  but  certainly  with 
weariness.  The  true  school  is  the  one  in  which 
everybody  acts,  the  pupils  as  well  as  the  master. 
"The  teacher  speaks;  he  pronounces  sentences  and 
the  pupils  repeat  them.  The  teacher  asks  questions : 
the  pupils  reflect  and  reply.  Long  expositions  are 
tiring;  questions  excite  and  enliven.  Action,  the 
source  of  happiness  in  life,  is  also  the  condition  of 
progress  in  school.  Let  us  unceasingly  enliven  and 
awaken  the  intelligence.  Let  us  make  the  active 


74  PESTALOZZI 

faculties,  attention  and  judgment,  predominate 
over  the  passive  faculties,  such  as  memory,  and  for 
mechanical  education  let  us  substitute  active  in- 
struction which  stimulates  the  attention,  stirs  the 
will,  and  sets  in  motion  the  inner  forces  of  the 
mind." 

It  will  perhaps  be  objected  that  this  appeal  to 
activity  does  not  seem  to  be  in  accordance  with 
what  is  known  of  Pestalozzi's  academic  practice  and 
with  the  unbounded  ardour  which  he  himself  dis- 
played in  his  teaching.  Did  he,  full  of  activity  as 
he  was,  allow  an  opportunity  for  the  pupils  to  make 
their  initiative  apparent?  At  Stans  he  is  depicted 
for  us  as  continually  in  motion,  going  from  one  end 
of  the  class  room  to  the  other,  harassing  the  pupils 
and  giving  them  not  one  moment's  respite.  At 
Burgdorf,  "he  bawled  out  the  ABC  from  morn  till 
night/7  in  a  stentorian  voice,  until  he  made  himself 
hoarse;  and  he  pretended  that  the  children  took 
an  extreme  pleasure  in  repeating  for  hours  after 
him  6  a,  ba.  To  which  Ramsauer,  one  of  his  pupils, 
replied  ironically,  "It  was  enough  rather  to  drive 
away  their  guardian  angels !  .  .  ."  None  the  less 
is  it  true  that  the  master's  activity  summons  the 
activity  of  the  pupil.  Flaubert  wrote  somewhere : 
"Instruct  yourselves,  enlightened  classes.  Before 
sending  the  people  to  school,  go  there  yourselves!" 


PESTALOZZI  75 

In  the  same  way,  one  can  say  to  teachers:  "You 
wish  to  interest  the  children  ?  Begin  by  interesting 
yourselves  in  your  teaching.  It  is  impossible  to 
communicate  an  emotion  not  felt  by  one's  self,  or  to 
make  others  share  in  a  taste  in  which  one  does  not 
participate.  It  is  necessary  to  give  before  one  can 
hope  to  receive." 

There  is  no  doubt  that,  in  practice,  Pestalozzi 
often  contradicted  himself.  In  spite  of  his  good 
intentions,  he  himself  fell  back  into  routine  and 
mechanical  teaching.  As  a  general  rule,  however, 
Pestalozzi's  exuberant  and  boisterous  activity  formed 
no  obstacle  to  the  activity  of  his  pupils,  whilst,  on 
the  contrary,  its  aim  and  result  was  to  provoke  and 
sustain  such  activity.  If  he  was  restless,  it  was  to 
encourage  the  hard-working  in  their  ardour  and  to 
awaken  the  indolent  from  their  torpor.  If  he  acted, 
it  was  to  make  others  act.  He  set  the  example  of 
movement  and  effort,  an  example  which  was  fol- 
lowed. Is  not  the  true  means  of  calling  others  to  life 
to  begin  by  being  alive  one's  self? 

An  active  instruction,  in  which  the  master  points 
out  the  way,  but  lets  the  child  walk,  in  which  he 
exerts  himself  principally  in  providing  opportunities 
for  observation  and  personal  reflection,  does  not 
merely  result  in  directly  preparing  education's  work, 
that  is  to  say,  the  formation  of  the  human  faculties. 


76  PESTALOZZI 

It  contributes  indirectly  to  the  same  result,  by 
exciting  the  interest  and  by  profiting  from  the  charm 
which  well-directed  studies  inspire:  not  indeed 
the  charm  which  dispenses  with  effort,  and  which 
tends  to  transform  serious  study  into  puerile  amuse- 
ment, but,  on  the  contrary,  the  charm  which  insures 
effort  by  assisting  it.  Pestalozzi,  who  owed  some- 
thing to  Basedow  and  the  Philanthropiniste  school, 
did  not  fall  like  them,  however,  into  the  puerilities 
of  amusing  instruction.  Should  not  everything 
contribute  to  making  instruction  " attractive/'  — 
Pestalozzi  used  the  word  before  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer, 
—  in  a  system  of  education  in  which  everything 
aspired  to  being  brightness  and  light,  in  which  truth, 
issuing  from  intuition,  rendered  useless  those  long 
verbose  explanations,  which  are  about  as  efficacious, 
for  illumining  the  mind  and  dissipating  error,  as 
the  ringing  of  bells  is  efficacious  for  driving  away 
threatened  storms;  and  in  which,  lastly,  the  most 
ingenious  methods  were  contrived,  so  as  to  proceed 
by  easy  stages  and  impel  the  intelligence  from  easy 
things  to  those  more  difficult,  and  at  last  to  procure 
for  the  pupil  the  great  joy  of  activity? 

Such  was,  indeed,  Pestalozzi's  preoccupation. 
When,  in  1816,  he  received  a  visit  at  Yverdon  from 
Andr£  Bell,  who  was,  with  Lancaster,  the  propa- 
gator in  England  of  mutual  instruction,  he  oblig- 


PESTALOZZI  77 

ingly  expounded  his  method  to  him.  Bell,  in  his 
turn,  explained  his.  The  two  pedagogues  came 
into  touch,  but  their  minds  did  not  unite.  Bell 
left  without  being  touched  by  the  Pestalozzian  grace. 
He  found,  as  it  were,  nothing  deserving  praise  in 
the  rules  followed  at  Yverdon,  although  Pestalozzi 
had  explained  them  to  him  at  length.  He  had  told 
him  how,  among  all  the  possible  motives  for  activity, 
—  if  he  excluded  amour  propre  as  far  as  possible, 
if  he  reckoned  on  attachment  to  duty  and  on  affec- 
tion for  parents  and  masters,  —  he  placed  interest 
in  study  first  and  foremost,  that  interest  which  in- 
struction cannot  fail  to  excite  when  it  is  simple, 
familiar,  progressive,  and  exactly  adjusted  to  the 
degree  of  intellectual  development  in  each  chilcL_ 
One  last  point  to  be  noted  in  the  general  charac- 
teristics of  Pestalozzi's  method  is  the  great  care 
which  he  took  in  simplifying  the  processes  of  instruc- 
tion, in  simplifying  them  to  such  a  degree  that  their 
manipulation  was  made  easy  even  for  the  unlearned. 
The  intention  was  praiseworthy,  but  the  inference 
was  excessive  and  false.  "  You  wish  to  make  teach- 
ing mechanical,"  Pestalozzi  was  told  one  day;  and 
Pestalozzi  joyfully  acquiesced  in  this  unlooked- 
for  definition  of  his  method.  He  dreamed,  in  fact, 
of  a  harmony  of  processes  simple  and  precise  enough 
for  the  least-prepared  teacher,  the  least-informed 


78  PESTALOZZI 

mother,  an  elder  sister,  or  even  a  devoted  servant, 
to  be  able  to  apply  it  with  good  results.  He  cher- 
ished the  chimera  of  a  method  which  should  owe  its 
entire  efficacy  to  the  perfection  of  its  arrangements 
and  not  to  the  ability  of  those  who  put  it  into  prac- 
tice: like  a  machine  so  perfect  in  the  precision  of 
its  component  parts  that  the  least  skilled  workman 
can  work  it.  Simplification  is  the  great  art,  said 
he,  and,  in  the  exaggeration  of  his  thought,  he  went 
so  far  as  to  say  that  the  normal  schools  and  the  scho- 
lastic libraries  were  quite  unnecessary  for  the  for- 
mation of  the  people's  educators,  that  in  the  future 
it  would  be  sufficient  to  put  into  the  hands  of  any 
teacher  that  Livre  des  Meres,  of  which  he  spoke  so 
much  in  his  Lettres  a  Gessner,  but  which  he  never 
found  time  to  write.  In  this  he  was  false  to  him- 
self ;  for  never  was  there  a  teacher  who  spared  him- 
self so  little  and  put  as  much  of  his  heart  and  soul 
into  his  practical  work  of  education.  But  he  sus- 
pected that  it  would  be  very  difficult,  if  not  impos- 
sible, when  education  should  be  generalized  and  made 
universal,  to  require  from  the  innumerable -teachers, 
scattered  throughout  the  multitude  of  schools,  the 
ardour  and  enthusiasm  which  he  himself  possessed. 
And  this  is  why  he  considered  the  success  of  element- 
ary education,  in  the  future  of  mankind,  as  insepa- 
rable from  and  conditional  upon  the  invention  of 


PESTALOZZI  79 

an  instrument,  a  pedagogic  machine,  whose  perfec- 
tion should  reduce  the  workmanship  almost  to  noth- 
ing. Let  us  add,  to  say  all,  that  this  great  friend 
of  the  school  allowed  himself  at  times  to  consider 
it  as  a  kind  of  makeshift,  a  temporary  expedient 
to  which  we  are  condemned  for  a  time  by  the  igno- 
rance of  our  parents  and  their  disheartening  lack 
of  aptitude  for  educating  their  own  children.  It  was 
not  only  with  a  view  to  the  careful  treatment  of 
the  frail  intelligence  of  children  that  he  projected 
his  plan  for  simplifying  methods.  It  was  principally 
to  make  his  supreme  dream,  the  education  of  a  child 
by  its  mother,  capable  of  realization.  He  would 
willingly  have  consented  to  the  disappearance  of 
the  elementary  school  and  the  institution  in  its 
stead  of  the  "family  room/'  in  which  an  attentive, 
tender  mother,  workwoman,  or  peasant,  as  well  as 
woman  of  the  middle  classes,  armed  with  her  Manuel, 
would  herself  instruct  her  sons  and  daughters. 

From  these  essential  principles  are  derived  the 
processes  devised  by  Pestalozzi:  inventions  which, 
for  the  greater  part,  are  ingenious  rather  than  sound, 
and  evidence  more  good  will  than  skill  and  ability. 

Let  us  remark  first  —  we  have  already  given  it 
to  be  understood  —  that  Pestalozzi,  in  practice, 
was  often  untrue  to  his  theoretical  maxims.  The 
apostle  of  intuition  and  nature's  education  did  not 


80  PESTALOZZI 

allow  the  natural  laws  sufficient  freedom  of  action, 
and  he  subjected  intuition  to  rules  which  were  arti- 
ficial in  the  extreme.  He  claimed  to  educate  the 
child  in  the  liberty  of  its  aspirations  and  the  spon- 
taneity of  its  inclinations,  but  round  about  it  he 
wove  a  close,  imprisoning  network  of  minute  method- 
ical exercises,  in  which  its  spontaneity  ran  great 
risk  of  disappearing,  and  its  initiative  is  constrained 
and  crushed.  A  story  is  told  concerning  a  man 
who  kept  bees,  and,  being  of  a  very  inventive  turn 
of  mind,  reflected  one  day  that  the  bees  really 
took  too  much  trouble  in  flying  here  and  there,  going 
from  garden  to  garden  and  from  flower  to  flower, 
in  order  to  gather  their  honey.  He  then  conceived 
the  idea  of  himself  gathering  them  a  heap  of  flowers 
of  every  species  and  carefully  making  them  into 
bunches  which  he  placed  ready-made  in  front  of 
the  hivfes.  .  .  .  The  story  does  not  tell  whether 
the  bees  gave  up  their  free  cross-country  flight  and 
chance  harvest;  nor  whether  those,  if  any  there 
were,  who  satisfied  themselves  with  the  flowers 
whose  spoil  had  been  made  ready  for  them,  had^ 
better  honey  in  their  combs.  ...  Is  not  this 
almost  the  image  of  the  attempt  in  which  Pestalozzi 
went  astray  when  he  thought  it  necessary  to  sub- 
mit the  child  to  the  necessity  of  imprisoning  its 
thought  in  rigid  lists  of  objects,  systematically 


PESTALOZZI  81 

arranged,  instead  of  allowing  relative  liberty  to 
the  course  of  its  observations?  It  has  been  said, 
and  not  altogether  wrongly,  that  the  application  of 
the  Pestalozzian  methods  would  be  disastrous  and 
fatal  to  the  imagination.  The  flight  of  a  child's 
intelligence  must  be  guided  but  not  restrained.  It 
is  no  more  appropriate  to  put  a  new-born  babe  under 
the  yoke  of  a  geometrical  discipline,  in  order  to 
accustom  it  to  observe  and  reflect,  than  it  would 
be  to  employ  a  sergeant-at-arms  to  teach  it  to  walk. 
At  the  risk  of  a  few  stumbles  let  us  let  the  child  try 
to  walk  by  itself.  At  the  risk  of  coming  to  wrong 
conclusions  in  its  researches  and  making  more  than 
one  mistake,  let  us  be  willing  for  it  to  look  to  right 
and  left,  examining  freely  according  to  its  fancy. 
On  this  condition  alone  will  it  learn  to  think  for  j 
itself;  whilst  on  the  other  hand  an  excessive  sys-  / 
tern  of  rules  would  oppress  and  destroy  that  natural 
spontaneity  which  must  be  respected,  if  we  wish  to 
train  flexible  intelligences,  rich  in  imagery  and  idea, 
and  to  form  free  minds. 

Nothing  can  better  throw  light  upon  what  was 
artificial  and  false  in  Pestalozzi's  methods,  than  the 
satirical,  perhaps  somewhat  exaggerated,  picture 
which  Ramsauer  drew  of  the  exercises  to  which 
he  was  himself  subjected  during  his  stay  in  the 
institution  at  Burgdorf.  "What  we  did  best," 


82  PESTALOZZI 

said  he,  "were  the  language  exercises,  especially 
those  having  as  their  subject  the  old  tapestry,  all 
in  holes,  which  Pestalozzi  forced  us  to  consider  in 
all  its  details  for  hours  at  a  time.  —  Children,  what 
do  you  see  ?  —  I  see  a  hole  in  the  tapestry.  —  Good ; 
repeat  after  me :  I  see  a  hole  in  the  tapestry.  .  .  . 
I  see  a  long  hole  in  the  tapestry.  .  .  .  Behind  the 
tapestry,  I  see  the  wall,  etc.  .  .  ."  These  somewhat 
grotesque  exercises  were,  in  truth,  only  a  caricature 
of  intuitive  teaching.  Instead  of  the  torn  and  worn- 
out  tapestry,  which  Pestalozzi  made  his  pupils 
study  because  of  the  poverty  of  his  scholastic  ap- 
pliances, and  of  which  the  particularized  analysis 
was  scarcely  able  to  excite  the  interest  which  he 
considered  nevertheless  to  be  the  principle  of  prog- 
ress in  study,  why  did  he  not  show  them  natural 
objects,  genuine  material  for  lessons  on  well-under- 
stood things  of  which  the  examination  would  not  have 
been  merely  an  occasion  for  wearisome  exercises  in 
language,  but  which  might  have  given  rise  to  a  series 
of  interesting  observations  and  have  prepared  for 
the  acquisition  of  as  many  useful  and  practical 
pieces  of  information?  And  in  the  tapestry  itself, 
however  wretched  that  object  of  study  may  have 
been,  should  he  not  have  called  his  pupils7  atten- 
tion to  something  more  than  accidents  of  form  and 
shape,  or  the  length,  breadth,  and  number  of  holes, 


PESTALOZZI  83 

—  have  taught  them,  for  example,  of  what  textile 
substances  it  was  made,  what  workmen  had  pro- 
duced it,  and  for  what  purposes  it  was  intended  ?  .  .  . 
By  a  singular  contradiction  with  his  own  prin- 
ciples, then,  Pestalozzi  forgot  reality  and  nature,  to 
linger  over  questions  of  vocabulary.  In  so  doing, 
he  claimed,  however,  that  he  was  applying  one  of 
his  favourite  theories,  to  which  he  wrongly  attached 
prime  importance.  I  refer  to  the  famous  classi- 
fication which  consisted  in  bringing  all  elementary 
knowledge  under  three  heads,  a  kind  of  trilogy: 
number,  shape,  and  word,  or,  in  other  terms,  arith- 
metic, geometry,  and  language.  In  the  simplicity 
of  his  somewhat  narrow  philosophy,  Pestalozzi 
flattered  himself  that  in  this  he  had  made  a  great 
discovery.  He  brought  forward  his  theory  as  a 
sort  of  marvellous  revelation,  brought  to  him,  as 
he  said,  by  a  Deus  ex  machina,  to  extricate  him  from 
difficulty,  in  the  midst  of  his  laborious  researches, 
like  a  flash  of  light  which  all  at  once  illuminated 
"his  vague,  irresolute  reveries."  What  captivated 
him  was  that  he  thought  he  had  by  this  theory 
separated  the  essential  part  of  things  from  what  is 
accessory  and  the  qualities  common  to  all  objects 
from  those  which  are  merely  accidental.  Every- 
thing that  has  a  material  existence,  indeed,  has 
a  shape;  all  objects  can  be  counted  and  added  up; 


84  PESTALOZZI 

lastly,  they  can  all  be  expressed  in  words.  But 
to  begin  with,  why  make  a  separate  category  for 
the  "word,"  since  the  "word"  is  the  expression 
of  all  thought,  whatever  its  nature,  and  since  unities 
can  be  counted  and  shapes  defined  only  by  means 
of  words?  Further,  do  not  natural  objects  possess 
other  qualities  common  to  them  all  ?  Should  Pesta- 
lozzi,  who  often  mentions  the  Appenzell  women, 
on  account  of  their  habit  of  hanging  paper  birds  of 
many  colours  on  the  cradles  of  new-born  children, 
have  forgotten  that  colour  also  is  a  universal  quality 
of  things  ?  And  why  should  not  the  composition  of 
bodies,  their  uses,  causes,  and  effects,  be  given  a 
place  in  elementary  study?  A  child  is  not  truly 
educated  if  it  can  only  calculate,  measure,  and  talk. 
If  its  knowledge  goes  no  farther  it  will  be  deficient 
in  all  the  useful  knowledge  which  the  natural  and 
physical  sciences  contain.  A  calculator  and  geome- 
trician, it  has  grasped  only  the  two  abstractions  of 
shape  and  number  from  amongst  the  complex  reali- 
ties of  the  world  and  animated  nature. 

It  would  be  profitless  to  dwell  on  a  narrow,  paltry 
conception,  which  proves  to  what  a  degree  those 
minds  which  have  most  thoroughly  freed  themselves 
from  the  old  routines  are  themselves  liable  to  create 
new  ones.  We  will  only  retain  one  of  its  articles: 
the  importance  which  Pestalozzi  rightly  accorded 


PESTALOZZI  85 

to  the  study  of  words.  Language,  when  it  responds 
to  clear  intuitions,  when  it  is  the  correct  expression 
of  precise,  plain  thought,  is,  indeed,  as  he  considered 
it,  the  essential  instrument  for  the  liberation  of  the 
mind.  And  Pestalozzi  cannot  be  too  highly  praised 
for  having  applied  himself  to  the  discovery  of  prac- 
tical means  of  establishing  a  strict  adaptation  of 
word  to  idea,  in  the  consciousness  and  on  the  lips 
of  the  child.  "If  the  peoples  of  Europe,"  said  he, 
"have  fallen  so  low,  it  is  because,  in  the  popular 
schools,  such  importance  has  been  given  to  words 
devoid  of  meaning  that  not  only  attention  to  nat- 
ural impressions,  but  even  the  faculty  of  receiving 
such  impressions,  has  been  destroyed  in  the  human 
mind.  Children  have  not  been  taught  to  speak.  .  .  ." 
Language  should  be  learned  by  use,  and,  as  has 
been  said,  Pestalozzi  did  away  with  grammar  as 
though  by  magic.  It  is  true  that  here  again  he  did  not 
proscribe  artificial  mechanism  with  sufficient  severity. 
Thus,  impatient  and  in  haste  to  develop  his  pupils'  vo- 
cabulary rapidly,  he  made  them  learn  by  heart  long 
lists  of  words,  which  related  to  nothing  within  their 
experience.  Thus,  also,  he  wrongly  extended  the 
language  exercises  beyond  the  circle  of  intuitions  al- 
ready acquired.  In  the  same  way,  under  the  pretext 
that  ability  to  describe  must  precede  ability  to  define, 
he  made  them  recite  ready-made  descriptions,  —  for 


86  PESTALOZZI 

example,  descriptions  of  walking  or  of  being  seated. 
The  adversary  of  book  education  and  school  chatter 
came  to  grief  himself  over  a  fresh  form  of  verbiage. 
"My  system,"  said  he,  "is  a  refinement  of  nature." 
He  refined,  indeed,  and  to  excess.  See,  for  example, 
how  he  understood  the  study  of  drawing.  Nature, 
according  to  him,  does  not  give  lines  to  the  child: 
it  presents  objects  in  the  varied  complexity  of  their 
forms.  From  which,  it  would  seem,  he  should  logi- 
cally have  concluded  that,  in  its  first  attempts  at 
drawing,  the  child  should  be  trained  to  represent 
1 1  things  as  it  sees  them.  This  is  by  no  means  his 
'  conclusion:  he  asked,  on  the  contrary,  that  the  child 
be  made  to  trace  lines,  arcs,  and  angles.  In  this,  he 
went  against  the  primitive  instinct  of  both  human- 
ity  and  infancy.  Are  we  not  taught  by  travellers 
that,  amongst  African  tribes,  for  example,  the  notion 
of  the  right  angle  is  unknown,  and  that  in  Abyssinia 
as  well  as  in  the  Congo,  the  houses  and  huts  are 
usually  round?  Abstraction  predominates  in  that 
peculiar  A  B  C  de  VintuitioUj  in  which  Pestalozzi 
claimed  to  reduce  the  diversity  of  natural  shapes  to 
geometrical  forms.1  One  feels  inclined  to  smile  at 

1  Let  us  take  note,  however,  that  M.  Eugene  Guillaume,  an- 
other expert  in  these  matters,  agrees  with  Pestalozzi,  and  wishes 
the  apprentice  draughtsman  to  begin  with  the  study  of  geometrical 
lines.  This  practice  is  the  one  which  has  prevailed.  The  Pesta- 
lozzian  idea,  as  the  inspiring  principle,  has  entered  all  schools. 


87 

the  declaration  made  in  all  seriousness,  "If  I  have 
had  a  merit  in  my  life,  it  is  that  I  placed  the  square 
at  the  base  of  intuitive  education."  Luckily, 
Pestalozzi  had  other  merits!  Ravaisson,1  an  ex- 
pert in  these  matters,  wrote:  "They  were  greatly 
in  error  who  wished  to  restore  the  art  of  drawing 
to  a  kind  of  science  founded  on  geometry.  This 
was  an  invention  of  Pestalozzi's,  who  thought  that 
he  had  thus  found  a  means  of  putting  drawing 
within  the  reach  of  the  middle  classes."  And  Ra- 
vaisson concluded  that  "to  simplify  the  contours 
of  things,  so  complicated  in  animated  nature,  by 
bringing  them  back  to  straight  lines  and  circles,  was 
to  distort  and  debase  the  forms  after  the  manner 
of  the  materialists.  .  .  ."  Certainly  there  was  no 
trace  of  materialism  in  Pestalozzi's  conception: 
he  simply  gave  way  to  the  tendency  of  introducing 
a  precision  quite  geometrical  into  elementary  studies. 
The  tendency  became  more  pronounced  at  Yverdon, 
where,  under  Schmid's  influence,  mathematics  be- 
came the  principal  preoccupation.  The  Pere  Girard 
remarked  on  this  in  his  Rapport  officiel  for  1808, 
"I  pointed  out  to  my  old  friend  Pestalozzi  that 
he  allowed  mathematics  an  inordinate  measure  of 
dominion,  and  that  I  feared  the  results  for  educa- 

1  See  the  article  on  Histoire  de  V enseignement  du  dessin,  in  M.  P. 
Buisson's  Dictionnaire  de  pedagogic. 


88  PESTALOZZI 

tion.  .  .  ."  Pestalozzi  did  not  deny  this,  and  re- 
plied with  his  customary  vivacity,  "That  is  because 
I  wish  my  children  to  believe  nothing  that  cannot 
be  demonstrated  to  them  as  clearly  as  that  two 
and  two  make  four." 

It  is  not  without  surprise  that  we  find  an  apostle 
of  nature,  by  an  involuntary  deviation  from  his 
principles,  using  artificial  methods  of  constraint 
and  regulation  pushed  to  extremes.  He  said  that 
it  is  not  to  the  forest  or  the  meadow  that  a  child 
must  be  taken  to  teach  it  how  to  know  trees  and 
plants.  And  he  gave  as  his  reason  that,  in  the 
forest  and  the  meadow,  trees  and  plants  are  mingled 
and  the  vegetable  species  are  mixed.  Let  us  con- 
clude that  he  went  somewhat  at  haphazard,  vacillat- 
ing from  one  method  to  another,  capable  rather  of 
sudden  inspiration  than  of  sustained  reflection. 
"  Every  day  I  feel  how  unknown  to  me  are  the  re- 
sults of  my  method.77  He  would  have  been  no  less 
at  a  loss  to  arrange  its  so  often  irreconcilable  rules. 

In  many  matters  he  made  happy  innovations; 
he  applied  the  principle  of  intuition.  At  Yverdon 
he  taught  geography  by  direct  observation  in  the 
neighbouring  valleys  or  on  the  Jura  mountains.  The 
pupils  brought  back  from  their  excursions  supplies 
of  clay  which  they  afterwards  used  to  reproduce  in 
relief  the  valley  which  they  had  studied  on  the 


PESTALOZZI  89 

spot.  It  was  only  after  several  days'  work,  when 
the  relief  was  finished,  that  they  passed  on  to  the 
study  of  maps.  It  is  to  Pestalozzi  that  Carl  Hitter, 
the  celebrated  German  geographer,  ascribes  the 
merit  of  the  inspiration  which  had  directed  him 
in  his  work.  " Pestalozzi, "  said  he,  "did  not  know 
as  much  geography  as  a  child  in  our  primary  schools ; 
it  was,  however,  whilst  talking  to  him,  during  my 
repeated  visits  to  Yverdon,  that  I  felt  the  impulse 
towards  natural  methods  awaken  in  me." 

How  many  processes,  now  familiar  in  the  schools 
of  every  country  in  the  world,  were  initiated  by 
Pestalozzi !  How  many  teachers  are  Pestalozzians 
without  knowing  it !  He  was  perhaps  the  first  to 
subordinate  reading  to  oral  exercises,  which  was  a 
most  important  reform.  For  teaching  how  to  speak 
he  did  not  always  rely  on  the  old  Burgdorf  tapestry : 
he  asked  that  the  child  be  shown  objects  which  please 
it  and  captivate  its  attention,  and  that  it  be  made 
to  touch  and  understand  them.  He  put  off  reading 
as  long  as  he  could.  The  child  should  be  able  to 
talk  before  learning  to  read.  For  reading  he  used 
movable  letters,  each  pasted  on  a  card,  so  that,  by 
bringing  them  together,  all  the  syllabic  combinations 
could  be  displayed.  To  strike  the  senses,  he  had 
multitudinous  little  inventions:  thus,  the  vowels 
were  coloured  red.  A  proceeding  to  which  he  was 


90  PESTALOZZI 

much  attached  was  rhymed  spelling:  the  pupils 
repeated  in  chorus  the  letter  or  syllable  which  they 
were  deciphering.  He  placed  writing  after  drawing : 
"  Writing  is  a  kind  of  special  linear  drawing  which 
is  merely  play  for  a  child  once  its  eyes  and  hand 
have  been  suitably  trained.'7  For  both  writing  and 
drawing  he  recommended  slate  and  pencil,  which 
should  be  preferred  to  pen  and  paper.  He  taught 
arithmetic  experimentally  and  by  concrete  methods. 
Before  conceiving  numbers  in  abstracto,  the  pupil 
should  have  grasped  their  material  value  by  adding  up 
actual  objects,  cherries,  nuts,  etc.  Before  calculating 
with  the  symbols  10,  12,  he  must  have  counted  the 
ten  fingers  of  the  hands  and  the  twelve  months  of 
the  year.  The  first  calculations  should  be  made  in 
the  head,  mentally,  without  the  help  of  paper. 
Pestalozzi  was  truly  one  of  the  promoters  of  mental 
calculation^  His  pupils  at  Burgdorf  and  Yverdon 
acquifecp11  a  short  time,  surprising  deftness  in  these 
exercises.  In  the  same  way,  with  geometry,  mate- 
rial objects  were  first  dealt  with:  "We  invented 
geometry/7  said  an  Yverdon  pupil. 

Elementary  instruction,  in  Pestalozzi's  scheme, 
aimed  at  reaching  every  faculty,  "the  hands  as  much 
as  the  head  and  heart/7  according  to  his  own  expres- 
sion. The  educators  first  duty  is  undoubtedly  to 
form  men:  "Apply  yourself  to  developing  children, 


PESTALOZZI  91 

not  training  them  as  dogs  are  trained."  To  this 
general  culture,  however,  some  elements  of  pro- 
fessional education  must  be  joined  at  an  early  stage. 
Pestalozzi  complained  bitterly  that  the  people  had 
no  technical  teaching  at  their  disposal  "except  such 
as  concerns  the  art  of  killing  men."  He  wished, 
in  consequence,  to  introduce  into  the  school,  if  not 
an  apprenticeship  to  this  or  that  given  trade,  at 
least  a  sort  of  general  preparation  for  every  trade. 
He  dreamed  of  compiling  a  technical  A  B  C,  in  which 
he  would  set  forth  graduated  exercises  on  the  element- 
ary actions,  —  carrying,  throwing,  drawing,  push- 
ing, brandishing,  twisting.  The  child  would  thus 
learn  from  it  to  develop  its  physical  aptitudes,  and 
would  acquire  that  suppleness  of  movement  and 
skill  in  the  use  of  the  organs  which  the  practice  of 
every  trade  exacts. 

Exercise,  experience,  practice,  —  these,  then,  are 
the  conditions  of  education  in  all  its  forms,  the  con- 
ditions of  moral  culture  as  well  as  intellectual  evolu- 
tion. If  it  be  true  that  a  teacher  can  especially 
communicate  to  his  pupils  the  qualities  which  he 
himself  possesses,  how  can  one  doubt  that  Pesta- 
lozzi particularly  excelled  in  moral  education? 
Here,  again,  intuition  is  the  principle.  No  pre- 
cepts, no  lessons  according  to  rule.  'I  do  not  find 
that  Pestalozzi  ever  thought  of  drawing  up  a  code 


92  PESTALOZZI 

of  theoretical  or  practical  morality.  Had  he  done 
so,  he  would  have  nearly  approached  Kant's  doc- 
trines, as,  for  example,  this  fine  maxim  would  prove : 
"When  I  improve  myself,  I  make^of  what  I  should 
the  rule  for  what  I  would."  No ;  but  in  relying  upon 
the  child's  good  feelings,  cleverly  aroused,  he  claimed 
to  establish  a  natural  and  organic  development  of 
practical  morality :  the  free  training  of  personality. 
As  his  pupil  speaks  before  being  able  to  read,  as 
he  sings,  intuitively,  because  he  has  heard  others 
singing,  before  knowing  a  single  note  of  music,  so 
he  is  to  be  virtuous,  without  virtue  having  been  men- 
tioned to  him.  In  his  optimism,  Pestalozzi  thought 
it  sufficient  to  awaken  the  latent  forces  of  the  con- 
science, in  order  to  lead  humanity  to  practise  well- 
doing. "At  Stans,"  said  he,  "I  taught  neither 
morality  nor  religion."  But  by  developing  in  his 
eighty  little  orphans  a  brotherly  love  and,  as  it  were, 
a  family  pride,  he  thought  to  direct  them  surely  tow- 
ard sentiments  of  justice  and  honour.  "I  strove/7 
said  he,  "to  arouse  the  sentiment  of  each  virtue 
before  pronouncing  its  name.7'  In  other  terms  it 
was  on  the  heart  and  on  the  sensibility  that  he 
wished  to  build  up  morality.  It  was  by  the  heart 
that  he  influenced  his  pupils,  not  by  the  dry  author- 
ity of  abstract  teaching.  No  master  has  succeeded 
in  making  himself  loved  as  he  was.\  "We  loved 


PESTALOZZI  93 

him,"  declared  one  of  his  pupils;  "we  all  loved  him, 
because  we  knew  that  he  loved  us  all."  Was  it 
not  he,  moreover,  who  said,  "  Education  should  be 
benevolence  and  continued  kindness"? 

He  sought  every  possible  opportunity  of  urging  the 
children  to  display  their  generous  instincts,  and  also  xJ 
of  accustoming  them  to  overcome  their  bad  dis- 
positions. Often  has  this  touching  passage  been 
quoted  from  that  one  of  his  letters  to  Gessner  which 
he  wrote  in  1799,  during  the  few  weeks  which  he 
spent  at  Gurnigel:  "When  news  of  the  burning  of 
Altorf  reached  us  at  Stans,  I  gathered  together  my 
little  orphans  and  said  to  them:  'Altorf  is  burned 
down;  perhaps  at  this  moment  a  hundred  poor 
children  are  without  shelter,  bread,  and  clothes. 
Would  you  like  us  to  ask  our  good  government  to 
send  us  twenty  or  thirty  of  them,  that  we  may  £ 
receive  them  in  this  house  ? '  And  with  a  unanimous  A 
voice,  'Yes!  yes!'  they  answered.  —  'But,  chil- 
dren/ I  added, '  our  house  is  poor :  reflect.  If  these 
poor  children  are  given  you  for  comrades  you  will 
have  less  to  eat,  you  will  have  more  work  to  do; 
perhaps  you  will  be  obliged  to  share  your  clothes 
with  them.7  After  having  spoken  thus  to  them, 
with  all  the  force  of  which  I  was  capable,  I  made 
them  repeat  my  words,  in  order  to  assure  myself 
that  they  had  properly  understood  me.  Then  I 


94  PESTALOZZI 

again  put  the  question,  and  they  all  replied:  'Yes! 
yes !  even  should  we  have  less  food  and  more  work, 
we  should  be  pleased  for  them  to  come  with  us/Ji> 
It  was  not  from  the  school  that  Pestalozzi  expected 
the  most  efficacious  influence  in  this  stirring  up  of 
the  generous  emotions:  he  relied  principally  upon 
the  family,  and  in  the  family,  on  the  action  of  the 
mother.  Sentiments  of  love  and  gratitude  have 
their  chief  origin  in  the  relations  which  exist  between 
the  mother  and  the  little  child.  It  is  the  mother 
who  sows  love  in  the  heart  of  the  babe  at  her  breast. 
Pestalozzi  placed  the  mother  above  all,  the  loving 
mother,  careful  for  her  duties.  "The  essential 
thing,  young  mother,  is  for  your  child  to  prefer  you 
to  all  else,  and  for  you,  on  your  side,  to  prefer  noth- 
ing to  it."  Nothing  is  so  touching  as  the  repeated 
appeals  which  he  addressed  to  maternal  love  in  his 
thirteenth  Lettre  a  Gessner.  Rousseau's  invocations 
seem  cold  beside  them.  It  was  in  vain  that  he  was 
told:  i' Mothers,  such  as  you  wish  for,  you  will  not 
find !  To  escape  their  duties  they  will  pretext  the 
necessities  of  their  work  and  the  obligations  of  the 
workshop."  He  replied  with  enthusiasm:  "I  wish 
to  succeed  in  convincing  even  the  pagan  mothers 
of  the  most  remote  regions  of  the  universe.  And 
I  trust  in  the  mothers  of  my  country,  I  trust  in  the 
hearts  which  God  has  placed  in  their  breasts!" 


PESTALOZZI  95 

If  the  mother  is  to  reveal  the  moral  emotions,  she 
is  also  to  initiate  the  child  in  religious  sentiments. 
Pestalozzi's  religion  was  a  sincere  religion,  full  of 
sentimental  effusions,  which  were  almost  mystic 
and  devout.  At  Neuhof  he  blamed  himself  when 
he  missed  saying  his  prayers,  as  though  he  had  com- 
mitted a  crime.  It  was  with  his  heart  that  he 
believed  in  God.  "The  God  of  my  brain  is  a  chi- 
mera; I  know  no  other  God  than  the  God  of  my 
heart ;  and  it  is  only  by  my  faith  in  the  God  of  my 
heart  that  I  feel  myself  a  man.  Mother,  mother, 
by  your  commandments  you  showed  God  to  me, 
and  by  my  obedience  I  found  Him.  .  .  .  Mother, 
mother,  if  I  love  you,  I  love  God,  and  my  duty 
is  my  supreme  delight.  .  .  ."  The  mother,  then,  is 
the  intermediary  between  the  child  and  God.  It  is 
filial  love  which  leads  to  divine  love.  Pestalozzi 
rejected  from  his  faith  the  dogmas  of  Christianity, 
but  he  retained  its  spirit.  True  religion,  said  he, 
is  nothing  else  than  morality.  Very  indulgent 
towards  simple  piety,  —  "I  am  not  of  those  who 
turn  to  ridicule  the  rosary  and  prayer-book  of  poor 
people/'  —  he  was  himself  satisfied  with  adoring 
and  invoking  the  infinite  Bounty,  the  Love  which 
permeates  all  things.  And  it  was  even  in  this  form 
that  he  wished  God  to  be  presented  to  the  child: 
"After  teaching  it  on  her  bosom  to  lisp  the  name 


96  PESTALOZZI 

of  the  Divinity,  the  mother  will  show  it  the  universal 
Love,  in  the  rising  sun,  the  bubbling  stream,  the 
pearly  dewdrops  on  the  plants,  and  the  bright  colours 
of  the  flowers."  * 

As  a  whole,  and  in  all  its  applications,  Pestalozzi's 
method  —  and  this  in  no  way  lessens  its  merit  - 
remains  a  method  of  elementary  education.  The 
gift  which  he  received  was  for  the  education  of  the 
little  ones.  The  purpose  of  his  life  was  solely  and 
exclusively  the  education  of  little  children.  He 
had  no  other  aptitude  than  that,  and  he  knew  very 
well  that  infant  instruction  was  all  he  had  worked 
for,  and  that  he  could  succeed  in  nothing  else. 
"When  setting  my  foot  on  the  first  step  of  Burg- 
dorf  castle,  I  felt  myself  lost :  for  I  was  entering  upon 
a  career  which  could  bring  nothing  but  unhappiness 

*It  has  perhaps  been  noticed  that  Pestalozzi's  writings  no- 
where mention  a  special  education  for  women.  In  truth,  con- 
cerned, as  he  was  principally,  with  elementary  education,  he  did 
not  distinguish  girls  from  boys  in  the  primary  schools  at  Neuhof, 
Stans,  and  Burgdorf .  He  was  in  favour  of  the  principle  of  coedu- 
cation in  the  case  of  infants.  When  he  became  director  of  the 
institute  at  Yverdon,  he  took  care  to  organize,  in  1806,  a  special 
institute  for  girls  as  an  annex  to  the  establishment.  In  1807  he 
put  this  special  institute  under  the  direction  of  his  son's  widow, 
who  had  become  Madame  Ouster.  In  1808,  the  establishment 
was  reorganized  and  placed  under  the  direction  of  Mademoiselle 
Rosette  Kasthofer,  who  married  Niederer  in  1814.  It  is  none 
the  less  true  that  Pestalozzi  had  no  special  views  on  female  edu- 
cation. 


PESTALOZZI  97 

for  me,  having  in  no  measure  the  powers  and  talents 
which  the  direction  of  a  college  exacts."  This  has 
been  quite  understood  by  the  majority  of  his 
critics  also.  Destutt  de  Tracy  wrote:  "Pestalozzi's 
method  will  only  yield  its  full  promise  when 
applied  to  the  teaching  of  those  whose  instruc- 
tion should  be  very  restricted."  And  this  was 
Madame  de  Stael's  opinion  also:  "Pestalozzi's 
work  must  be  considered  as  at  present  limited 
to  infancy." 

I  am  well  aware,  and  we  have  already  mentioned 
it,  that  at  times  Pestalozzi  pushed  his  designs  far- 
ther. He  was  inspired  with  this  ambition  prin- 
cipally by  his  collaborators.  Indeed,  he  wrote  to 
Maine  de  Biran:  "  People  are  wrong  if  they  think 
that  my  method  should  only  expound  the  first 
elements  of  knowledge  and  education.  Youth  also 
must  be  governed  in  accordance  with  the  same  prin- 
ciples and  spirit."  In  other  words,  he  believed  it~T " 
possible  to  extend  his  method  of  elementary  educa-  ( 
tion  to  secondary  studies.  Assuredly,  in  all  degrees 
of  teaching,  it  is  good  for  the  master  to  be  an  ani- 
mater  of  minds,  for  him  to  interrogate,  to  set  in  ac- 
tion, to  stir  up  initiative  and  personal  research,  and 
professors  of  every  class  have  something  to  learn 
at  Pestalozzi's  school.  Nevertheless,  it  is  evident 
that  a  method  which  is  above  all  intuitive,  inductive, 


98  PESTALOZZI 

and  experimental,  as  was  Pestalozzi's,  exactly  suits 
only  the  beginnings  of  instruction.  Later,  with 
minds  already  formed,  the  didactic,  deductive, 
and  expository  method  reclaims  its  rights;  and  in 
this  field  Pestalozzi  was  quite  unable  to  succeed. 
"Let  him  then  be  content  with  the  glory  which  is 
his,  and  which  is  already  fine  enough,  —  the  glory 
of  having  been  one  of  the  founders  of  the  popu- 
lar school.  This  is  his  true  domain,  his  kingdom, 
at  once  the  honour  and  the  limit  of  his  power  as 
an  educator.  For  half  a  century  he  toiled,  with 
incomparable  ardour,  at  the  simplification  of  ele- 
mentary education.  In  1816,  he  wrote  to  Nicolo- 
vius:  "  If  I  do  not  succeed  in  preparing  at  least  the 
application  of  elementary  instruction  in  the  schools 
for  the  poor,  and  in  insuring  its  execution  after 
me,  the  essential  thing  in  which  I  can  still  serve 
humanity  will  be  lost:  I  shall  have  laboured  in 


vain." 


No,  he  did  not  labour  in  vain,  for  if  he  did  not  quite 
succeed  in  completing  his  work,  yet  will  people  not 
cease  to  seek  inspirations  from  his  writings  and 
examples  from  his  actions,  to  direct  the  child's  first 
steps :  at  the  age  when,  as  Madame  de  Stael  said,  it 
seems  "that  the  Creator  still  holds  the  creature  by 
the  hand  in  order  to  help  it  walk  gently  on  the 
clouds  of  life;"  an  age  at  which  it  is,  nevertheless, 


PESTALOZZI  99 

necessary  for  man's  hand  to  intervene,  a  firm  and 
gentle  hand,  which  guides  without  constraining, 
which  facilitates  effort  and  clears  the  path  of  knowl- 
edge from  all  difficulties  against  which  the  child's 
footsteps,  still  staggering  and  ill-assured,  might 
strike. 


VII 

PESTALOZZI'S  influence  has  been  considerable. 
When,  on  the  12th  of  January,  1846,  *  twenty  years 
after  his  death,  the  anniversary  of  his  birth  was 
celebrated  in  fifty-nine  Swiss  and  German  towns, 
it  could  be  seen,  from  the  numbers  and  the  zeal  of 
those  who  took  part  in  the  celebration,  what  a  deep 
and  lasting  power  he  had  exercised  over  people's 
minds,  and  to  what  a  degree  his  ideas  had  spread 
and  had  borne  fruit  throughout  central  Europe. 
He  was  not  mistaken  when,  in  the  preface  to  the 
Manuel  des  Meres,  he  said,  "The  form  of  my 
method  will  perish,  but  the  life-giving  spirit,  the 
spirit  of  my  method,  will  survive.77  Diesterweg,2 
the  celebrated  director  of  the  Berlin  Normal  School, 
who  was  the  principal  organizer  of  this  commemora- 
tive ceremony,  paid  him  glorious  homage,  in  a  speech 
in  which  he  drew  a  comparison  between  the  schools 

1  The  anniversary  was  more  particularly  solemnized  at  Berlin 
and  Copenhagen. 

2  Diesterweg  fell  into  disfavor  a  short  time  after,  and  was  forced 
to  retire  in  1847.     The  zeal  displayed  by  him  in  the  service  of 
Pestalozzi's  liberal  pedagogy  was  not  foreign  to  his  revocation. 

100 


PESTALOZZI  101 

of  former  days  and  those  of  the  mid-nineteenth 
century,  and  gave  Pestalozzi  credit  for  the  changes 
which  had  been  accomplished.  "His  work/'  said 
he,  "has  become  the  foundation  of  German  public 
schools;77  and  he  went  through  the  long  list  of  Ger- 
man educators  who  more  or  less  have  their  origin 
in  him.  Further,  effectively  to  honour  the  great 
teacher's  memory,  he  projected  the  organization 
of  an  orphanage,  to  bear  the  name  of  Institut  pes- 
talozzien. 

While  yet  alive,  however,  Pestalozzi  had  wit- 
nessed a  triumphant  propagation  of  his  doctrine. 
It  has  been  said  that  he  understood  better  "how 
to  raise  ideas  than  men.7'  How  then  account 
for  this  multitude  of  disciples,  whose  calling  he 
determined,  whom  he  inflamed  with  his  enthusiasm, 
who  went  into  every  land  sowing  the  Pestalozzian 
idea?  Sometimes  it  only  required  an  interview 
or  a  few  hours7  conversation  to  win  over  an  indiffer- 
ent visitor,  or  to  make  a  new  apostle  of  a  passer-by : 
as,  for  example,  the  young  German  baron,  de  Renne- 
camp,  who  was  for  a  few  days  a  guest  at  the  Yverdon 
institution  in  1808.  He  was  received  soon  after 
at  Coppet,  in  Madame  de  StaePs  drawing-'rooms,  and 
warmly  praised  Pestalozzi  and  his  method.  Whilst 
he  was  speaking,  one  of  his  listeners,  Madame 
Recamier,  said  nothing,  and  busied  herself  arranging 


102  PESTALOZZI 

a  curl  of  her  beautiful  hair.  But  Benjamin  Constant, 
who  was  also  present  at  the  gathering,  whilst  doubt- 
less looking  at  Madame  Recamier,  listened  and  asked 
for  fuller  details  concerning  the  reformer.  Madame 
de  Stael  also  was  attentive,  and  displayed  a  marked 
curiosity,  which  she  was  to  satisfy  some  months 
later  by  visiting  Yverdon.  She  applauded  the 
young  interpreter  of  the  method,  whilst  he  explained 
that  the  master  of  Yverdon,  instead  of  making  edu- 
cation's end  the  acquirement  of  knowledge,  regarded 
that  only  as  a  means,  the  true  object  being  the 
development  of  intelligence.  And  she  prepared 
her  interview  with  Pestalozzi  by  the  most  flattering 
compliments.  She  wrote  to  him,  amongst  other 
things,  "I  am  convinced  that  your  methods  are 
able  to  compass  the  happiness  of  the  majority  of 
your  fellow-men,  and  particularly  of  the  most  un- 
happy and  abandoned  of  mankind.  .  .  ." 

It  was  naturally  in  Germany  that  Pestalozzi's 
influence  was  especially  noticeable.  Saxony  and 
Wurttemberg  owe  to  him  in  part  their  scholastic 
progress.  We  have  already  stated  the  ties  that 
bound  him  to  both  Herbart  and  Fichte.  The  phi- 
losopher of  "ego"  could  not  but  be  charmed  with 
a  pedagogue  who,  above  all,  aspired  to  form  the 
human  personality.  In  his  public  speeches,  at  the 
moment  when,  after  the  defeat  of  Jena,  Prussia 


PESTALOZZI  103 

was  undertaking  the  reform  of  its  schools,  he  hailed 
Pestalozzi  as  "the  man  of  genius  who  had  eman- 
cipated the  art  of  education  from  routine  and  em- 
piricism, in  order  to  base  it  on  the  philosophic  laws." 
And  in  a  private  letter  addressed  to  his  wife,  he 
recommended  her  in  these  terms  to  read  the  Lettres 
a  Gessner:  "I  find  in  this  system  of  education  the 
true  remedy  for  the  sufferings  of  sick  humanity," 
and  also  —  a  thing  not  likely  to  be  displeasing  to 
a  somewhat  obscure  thinker  —  "the  only  means 
of  fitting  it  for  an  understanding  of  my  own  phi- 
losophy." Froebel  also  should  be  counted  among 
Pestalozzi's  admirers.  He  went  to  Yverdon  for 
the  first  time  in  1805.  He  went  back  in  1808  and 
lived  there  for  two  years  with  three  pupils,  whom 
he  accompanied  to  all  the  lessons  at  the  institute. 
"It  was  a  decisive  time  in  my  life,"  he  wrote.  The 
future  creator  of  the  "children's  garden,"  and  of  the 
maternal  school,  could  not  but  feel  drawn  by  a 
secret  sympathy  towards  the  founder  of  the  ele- 
mentary school  which  is  its  continuation. 

The  impulse  given  by  Pestalozzi  did  not  have 
pedagogic  theories  and  plans  for  school  organization 
as  its  only  result.  It  also  produced  actual  estab- 
lishments, a  multitude  of  schools,  made  in  the  like- 
ness of  those  in  which  he  taught,  and  especially 
of  that  which  was  his  dream.  A  volume  would  be 


104  PESTALOZZI 

required  for  the  enumeration  of  all  the  founda- 
tions which  owed  their  existence  to  him :  in  Berlin, 
Plamann,  who  had  been  his  auditor  for  some  time, 
opened  a  school  in  1805  which  remained  in  exist- 
ence until  1830;  at  Frankfort,  which  became  a 
centre  of  Pestalozzianism,  there  was  Gruner's  school, 
in  which  Froebel  taught ;  at  Mayence,  F.-J.  Mtiller 
founded  a  school  about  1804.  It  is  not  sufficiently 
well  known  in  France  to  what  a  degree  Pestalozzi 
moved  and  dominated  the  German  imagination.1 
In  1808,  one  of  the  ministers  of  Wlirttemberg  wrote, 
"Our  king  has  become  a  Pestalozzian  from  head  to 
foot."  When,  in  1809,  Nicolovius,  one  of  Pesta- 
lozzi's  old  friends,  was  appointed  director  of  public 
instruction  for  the  kingdom  of  Prussia,  he  asked 
for  his  cooperation.  "Come  and  help  us,"  he  wrote 
to  him;  "what  I  dreamed  with  you  at  Neuhof  is 
about  to  become  a  reality.  The  seed  which  you 
scatter  here  will  germinate;  it  will  become  a  tree, 
whose  shade  will  shelter  a  whole  people.  .  .  ." 
The  moment  at  which  Pestalozzi  heard  that  the 
Prussian  government  was  preparing  to  reorganize 
the  schools  after  his  principles  was  one  of  great  ex- 
pectation for  him.  He  replied  with  childish  joy: 
"I  shall  not  die  then  before  the  harvest  which  I 
have  sown  approaches  maturity.  I  have  always 

1  In  1870,  Gutzkow,  the  novelist,  published  Fils  de  Pestalozzi. 


PESTALOZZI  105 

lived  awaiting  the  coming  of  a  king  to  whom  should 
be  given  the  power  necessary  to  benefit  mankind. 
You  have  found  this  king;  he  is  there!  .  .  ." 

If  the  Germanic  nations,  as  was  natural,  were 
more  especially  affected  by  the  Pestalozzian  influ- 
ence, there  is  scarcely  a  district  of  Europe,  in  the 
North  as  well  as  in  the  South,  which  has  remained 
foreign  to  the  movement.  Curiously  enough,  Spain, 
which  may  still  be  fairly  called  one  of  the  least 
advanced  of  European  nations  as  regards  education, 
was  one  of  the  first  to  attempt  the  introduction  of 
Pestalozzianism  within  her  borders.  Various  trials 
were  made:  firstly,  in  the  school  of  a  Tarragona 
regiment,  commanded  by  Voitel,  a  Swiss  captain 
in  the  Spanish  service;  again,  in  a  normal  school 
organized  at  Santander,  for  training  teachers  in 
the  new  method;  and,  lastly,  in  Madrid  itself,  in 
a  special  school  bearing  the  name  of  Real  Institute 
Pestalozziano  militar :  —  in  justification  of  the  last 
word  let  us  recall  that,  at  Burgdorf  and  Yverdon, 
Pestalozzi  had  his  pupils  put  through  some  military 
exercises.  The  Madrid  school  was  at  first  placed 
under  Captain  VoitePs  direction,  then  under  that  of 
Amoros,  who  became  known  later  in  France  as  the 
propagator  of  gymnastic  instruction.  Pestalozzian- 
ism had  its  hour  of  ascendency.  The  infante,  Don 
Francis  of  Paola,  was  brought  up  after  its  methods, 


106  PESTALOZZI 

and  the  school  for  the  poor  became  a  school  for 
princes.  This  was  the  realization  of  Pestalozzi's 
wish,  that  instruction  should  be  the  same  for  all. 
But  political  events  abruptly  suspended  the  experi- 
ment; the  Madrid  Institute  was  closed  in  1808, 
and  there  was  no  more  talk  of  Pestalozzi  in  Spain. 
I  can  scarcely  think  of  anybody  but  Comenius, 
as  whose  successor  Pestalozzi  may  be  considered, 
who  spread  so  far  across  Europe  the  propagation  of 
his  ideas.  The  Moravian  pedagogue  of  the  seven- 
teenth century  has  more  than  one  point  of  resem- 
blance with  the  Swiss  pedagogue  of  the  eighteenth. 
He  indeed  preceded  him  with  his  pedagogic  presenti- 
ments. Like  him,  and  to  a  greater  degree,  he  led 
a  wandering,  agitated  life.  This  first  evangelist  of 
modern  education  went  to  England  and  Sweden  to 
preach  his  faith  in  those  countries.  Pestalozzi  cer- 
tainly did  not  make  these  long  journeys;  but  his 
doctrine  at  least  circulated  there,  thanks  to  emis- 
saries who  came  to  study  it  on  the  spot  and  to  gather 
it  from  his  lips.  Thus,  in  1803,  the  Danish  govern- 
ment sent  to  Burgdorf  several  teachers  who,  on 
their  return,  opened  a  Pestalozzian  school  in  Copen- 
hagen. Bonaparte's  royal  creatures  showed  less  dis- 
dain than  he  for  the  ABC:  Murat,  king  of  Naples, 
in  1872,  and  Louis  Bonaparte,  king  of  Holland,  in 
1807,  tried  to  introduce  Pestalozzi's  methods  into 


PESTALOZZI  107 

the  schools  of  these  two  countries.  Success,  how- 
ever, did  not  always  attend  these  imitative  attempts. 
Unskilled  disciples  grasped  only  the  external  form, 
the  mere  mechanism,  of  the  method,  without  being 
able  to  borrow  from  the  master  the  spirit  which 
animated  the  system  and  made  it  productive. 

In  England,  the  effort  was  often  renewed  and  was 
prolonged.  Pestalozzi  had  received  a  number  of 
English  visitors  at  Yverdon,  among  others  Robert 
Owen,  the  famous  philanthropist,  and  Henry 
Brougham,  the  champion  of  popular  education,  who 
said  with  some  emphasis :  "  The  time  is  coming  when 
the  teacher  and  not  the  cannon  will  be  the  arbiter 
of  the  world."  But  it  was  especially  with  James 
Greaves,  a  young  thinker,  rather  obscure,  moreover, 
that  Pestalozzi  contracted  a  friendship.  Greaves 
stayed  at  Yverdon  from  1817  till  1822;  and,  during 
these  four  or  five  years,  he  became  intimate  with 
Pestalozzi.  He  served  him  as  an  interpreter  and 
cicerone  for  English  visitors,  and  was  intrusted  with 
the  teaching  of  English  to  the  pupils  of  the  normal 
school  at  Clindy.  Pestalozzi  valued  him  highly 
enough  to  say  that  "he  of  all  men  most  completely 
understood  the  end  which  he  had  in  view."  Greaves' 
zeal  was  so  ardent  that  he  was  not  satisfied  with 
passionately  espousing  Pestalozzi's  ideas  and  projects : 
he  cared  for  his  person.  It  has  been  narrated  that 


108  PESTALOZZI 

he  suffered  extremely  from  the  neglected  dress  of 
his  master,  who  scarcely  thought  of  making  his  toilet 
except  on  great  occasions  and  when  visiting  sover- 
eigns. He  was  grieved  at  the  unfavourable  impres- 
sion produced  on  strangers  by  his  worn  and  ragged 
clothes,  "his  old  gray  overcoat/7  What,  then,  did 
he  do?  He  discreetly  ordered  from  a  tailor  new 
suits,  which  were  placed  in  the  wardrobe,  during 
the  night,  in  the  place  of  the  old  ones.  .  .  .  Pesta- 
lozzi  made  no  comments,  and,  perhaps,  in  his  absent- 
mindedness,  scarcely  noticed  the  substitution.  .  .  . 
He  returned  Greaves'  affection,  and  it  was  for  him 
that,  in  1818  and  1819,  he  wrote  the  Lettres  sur 
I7  education  elementaire,  which  Greaves  translated 
into  English,  and  published  in  London  in  1827.1 
This  is  perhaps  the  best  exposition  of  his  doctrine 
that  Pestalozzi  produced.  In  it  he  renewed  his 
eloquent  appeals  to  mothers,  "to  the  mothers  of 
\Great  Britain."  In  it  he  insisted  on  the  truism 
that  a  pupil  should  not  be  a  passive  instrument, 
that  his  education  is  not  firmly  based  unless  he 
himself  be  the  "agent.77  On  his  return  to  England, 
Greaves  founded  a  school  at  Ham,  near  Richmond, 
in  which  he  attempted  to  apply  the  Yverdon 
methods.  He  had  been  preceded  in  Ireland  by 

1  We  have  a  second  edition  of  this  work,  published  in  1850, 
under  our"  eyes. 


PESTALOZZI  109 

Synge,  another  great  admirer  of  Pestalozzi,  who, 
after  staying  some  months  in  Switzerland,  published 
in  Dublin,  between  1815  and  1817,  several  anony- 
mous works,  in  which  he  considered  Pestalozzi's 
life  and  analyzed  his  writings.1  He  was  followed 
by  the  Reverend  Dr.  Mayo,  who,  in  1819,  had  taken 
fifteen  of  his  compatriots  to  Yverdon,  and  on  his 
return  to  England  applied  himself  to  bringing  the 
Pestalozzian  methods  within  reach  of  all.  Assisted 
by  Reiner,  an  Yverdon  pupil,  and  also  by  his  sister, 
Miss  Mayo,  he  organized  a  college  and  compiled  a 
certain  number  of  books,  Object  Lessons,  Lessons  on 
Number,  Lessons  on  Form,  liberally  imbued  with 
Pestalozzianism.  From  this  movement  came,  in 
1836,  the  scholastic  society  which,  under  the  name 
of  the  Home  and  Colonial  School  Society,  rendered 
real  service  to  English  popular  education.  A  sig- 
nificant proof  of  its  importance  is  that  Reiner,  one 
of  its  members,  was  chosen  by  Queen  Victoria  as 
tutor  to  her  children.  And  that  Pestalozzi  has 
preserved  some  credit  in  England  up  to  the  present 
time  is  shown  by  his  being  the  only  foreign  educator 
whom  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer  mentioned  by  name  in| 

1  Sullivan,  an  inspector  of  Irish  schools,  wrote  that  the  germ 
of  all  the  ameliorations  which  he  introduced  into  the  primary 
instruction  of  his  country  is  to  be  found  in  Pestalozzi 's  works 
(Papers  on  Popular  Education,  Dublin,  1863). 


110  PESTALOZZI 

his  book  on  Education;  it  is  also  shown  by  Pro- 
fessor Joseph  Payne's  devoting  to  him,  in  1875,  his 
fine  lecture  entitled,  Pestalozzi,  the  Influence  of  his 
Principles  and  Practice  on  Elementary  Education,  one 
of  the  most  instructive  studies  written  on  the  subject. 
It  would  be  impossible  for  us  to  follow  Pes- 
talozzi's  influence  everywhere  it  has  penetrated.  His 
name,  followed  by  his  thought,  has  actually  made 
the  circuit  of  the  globe.  One  of  his  assistants, 
Muralt,1  under  the  patronage  of  Czar  Alexander  I, 
established  an  educational  seminary  for  the  higher 
classes  of  Russian  society  at  St.  Petersburg,  about 
1815.  The  work  of  Uno  Cygnoeus,  the  Finnish 
school  reformer,  is  in  part  the  product  of  his  inspira- 
tion. In  the  New  World  as  well  as  the  Old,  he  had, 
and  still  has,  faithful  followers.  It  was  from  Paris 
that  Pestalozzian  reform  was  first  transmitted  to 
the  United  States.  A  Burgdorf  professor,  Neef, 
was  appointed  to  teach  in  a  Paris  orphanage  in  1803, 
and  his  class  was  even  honoured  by  an  official  visit 
from  Napoleon,  who  was  accompanied  by  Talley- 
rand. Maclure,  an  American  citizen,  was  present 
at  the  interview  and,  being  impressed  by  the  results 
obtained,  he  persuaded  Neef  to  leave  Paris  for 
Philadelphia,  whence  he  afterwards  went  to  New- 

1  Von  Muralt  belonged  to  a  noble  family  of  Zurich;   he  lived 
for  several  years  in  Paris. 


PESTALOZZI  111 

harmonic,  to  organize  the  Pestalozzian  teaching.1 
Later,  the  son  of  that  Krusi  who  was  Pestalozzi's 
first  collaborator  at  Burgdorf,  emigrated  to  America, 
and  became  professor  of  educational  science  in  the 
Oswego  Normal  School,  whose  founder,  Sheldon, 
introduced  and  applied  sight  teaching.  Oswego 
school,  established  in  New  York  State  in  1860,  has 
perhaps  more  than  any  other  school  influenced  the 
professional  education  of  American  masters.  "This 
was  due,"  said  the  Monograph  on  the  1900  Exhi- 
bition, "to  the  practical  application  of  Pestalozzi's 
method  and  ideas  by  Sheldon,  its  principal."  A 
few  years  earlier,  Lowell  Mason,  also  an  American, 
made  use  of  Pestalozzi's  method  for  singing  instruc- 
tion,2 as  formulated  by  Pfeiffer  and  Nageli,  two 
Yverdon  professors;  and  in  a  lecture  several  times 
repeated  before  a  crowded  audience  he  expounded 
Pestalozzianism  to  his  fellow-citizens.  Starting  from 
1835,  a  school  journal,  entitled  The  Pestalozzian, 
appeared  in  Ohio.  It  was  by  Americans  that  Horace 
Mann  was  called  the  illustrious  apostle  of  Pestalozzi.3 
Henry  Barnard,  in  his  important  publications, 
showed  how  highly  he  valued  the  experiments  at 
Stans  and  elsewhere.  And  again  this  year  we  read 

1  See  a  pamphlet  by  Mr.  William  S.  Monroe,  Joseph  Neef  and 
Pestalozzianism  in  America,  Boston,  1894. 

2  See  the  Pestalozzian  Music  Teacher,  Boston,  1871. 

3  Report  of  the  Commissioner  of  Education,  1892-1893,  p.  1658. 


112  PESTALOZZI 

in  an  American  journal:  "The  Stans  experiment 
was  destined  to  effect  a  revolution  in  men's  ideas 
on  education.  ...  It  can  be  said  with  truth  that 
the  present-day  educational  system  is  substantially 
Pestalozzian." i 

An  entire  and  interesting  chapter  could  be  written 
on  the  relations  of  French  thought  with  Pestalozzi. 
We  have  already  mentioned  the  efforts  of  Maine 
de  Biran,  who  especially  prized  the  Pestalozzian 
method  because  it  tended  "to  develop  equally  for 
all  that  faculty  of  reason  which  is  necessary  for  all 
ranks,  and  applicable  to  all  the  conditions  and  require- 
ments of  human  life."  Bergerac  school,  organized 
in  1808  with  Barraud's  cooperation,  lasted,  under 
very  varied  forms,  until  1881;  like  the  Burgdorf 
school,  it  quickly  became  transformed  into  a  kind 
of  college  for  the  middle  classes.  Maine  de  Biran, 
who  had  been  in  direct  correspondence  with  Pesta- 
lozzi, visited  him  at  Yverdon  in  1822;  he  found 
that  he  had  "deteriorated/7  and  that  he  was  ruled 
by  Schmid,  of  whom  the  French  philosopher  did 
not  form  a  favourable  opinion.  It  appeared  to  him 
that  Schmid  was  merely  "sharp."  This  enigmatical 
personage  whom,  in  his  simplicity,  Pestalozzi  lauded 
to  the  skies,  whilst  Fellenberg  called  him  "Satan," 
and  of  whom  M.  Hunziker  said  to  me  a  few  months 

1  The  Teacher's  Institute,  February,  1901. 


PESTALOZZI  113 

ago,  "Schmid  was  nothing  but  a  windbag,"  was 
received  by  France  after  the  dispersion  of  the  Yver- 
don  institution.  About  1830,  he  and  five  other 
Yverdon  professors  entered  the  Morin  Institute  in 
Paris,  where  he  gave  lessons  in  mathematics  until 
his  death,  which  occurred  in  1851.  He  it  was  who 
provided  Philibert  Pompee,  the  first  director  of 
the  Turgot  school,  with  material  for  the  preparation 
of  the  paper  which  he  submitted,  in  1847,  for  the 
competition  opened  by  the  Academy  of  Moral  and 
Political  Sciences  on  the  following  subject : "  A  critical 
examination  of  Pestalozzi's  system  of  instruction 
and  education,  considered  principally  in  its  relations 
to  the  welfare  and  morality  of  the  poorer  classes." 
A  great  many  other  facts  could  yet  be  mentioned 
proving  what  attention  France  accorded  Pestalozzi's 
works.1  Let  us  recall  the  articles  which  Madame 

1  Pestalozzi  has  rarely  been  attacked  and  criticised  in  France, 
but  the  Pere  Burnichon,  a  Father  of  the  Society  of  Jesus,  did 
assail  him.  What  grieves  me  in  this  affair  is  that  I  occasioned 
these  attacks,  which  were  especially  intended  to  be  unpleasant  to 
me.  Twenty  years  ago  I  ventured  to  write  that  Pestalozzi  was 
"famous,"  —  a  belief  in  which  I  persist,  —  and  that  he  well  de- 
served a  place  in  the  front  rank  of  the  men  who  have  done  honour 
to  the  fine  name  of  teacher.  Thereupon  the  Pere  Burnichon  de- 
clared war  against  poor  Pestalozzi,  of  whom  he  dared  to  say  that 
"he  was  deficient  in  brains."  There  are  many  people  whom 
we  might  wish  to  have  as  much !  And  he  added  that  "he  was  but 
little  known  in  France,"  proving  chiefly  that  he  himself  did  not 
know  him,  especially  when  he  defined  the  Yverdon  institute  as 
"a  kind  of  agricultural  colony." 


114  PESTALOZZI 

Guizot  wrote  on  Pestalozzi  in  1813,  for  the  Annales 
de  I'Education,  in  connection  with  Jullien's  com- 
mentary;—  the  report  which  Cuvier  drew  up  in 
1815,  after  a  visit  to  Yverdon,  where  he  had  been 
sent  by  Carnot  the  minister;  the  creation  of  a 
Pestalozzian  school  in  Paris,  in  1822,  by  Professor 
Boniface,  who  had  taught  the  French  language  at 
Yverdon,  from  1803  till  1817,  whose  grammatical 
studies  also  have  long  been  classics  in  France. 
Neither  should  it  be  forgotten  that  the  Societe  pour 
Vinstruction  elementaire  inscribed  Pestalozzi  among 
its  corresponding  members,  and  that  one  of  his 
friends,  Prefect  Lezay-Marnesia,  under  his  inspira- 
tion established,  in  1810,  at  Strasbourg,  the  first 
normal  school  in  France.  Our  great  historian, 
Michelet,  in  1870,  rendered  him  most  eloquent 
testimony  when  he  said  of  him  that  he  was  "a  flame, 
a  life,"  that  "he  improvised  men/7  and  that  he 
was  "a  true  saint.'7  It  was  another  Frenchman, 
M.  Guillaume,  who  wrote,  a  few  years  ago,  a  book 
which  is  the  best  biographical  study  on  Rousseau, 
even  if  it  be  compared  with  that  written  by  M. 
Morf.1  And  before  M.  Guillaume,  Pestalozzi  had 

1  M.  Morf,  director  of  the  Winterthur  orphanage,  collected  a 
large  number  of  original  documents  relating  to  Pestalozzi.  Be- 
tween 1864  and  1867  he  published  a  whole  series  of  detached  studies, 
and  he  devoted  to  him  a  most  interesting  and  complete  biography, 
in  four  parts,  which  appeared  in  1868,  1885,  and  1889. 


PESTALOZZI  115 

in  France  for  panegyrists  Augustin  Cochin  and 
Philibert  Pompee,  without  forgetting  Rapet,  who 
had  shared  with  Pompee  the  prize  of  the  Academy 
of  Moral  and  Political  Sciences,  for  a  monograph, 
still  in  manuscript/  to  which  the  Pedagogic  Museum 
at  Paris  owes  a  collection  of  Pestalozzian  books 
which  can  rival  that  in  the  Pestalozzianum  at  Zurich. 

Time  has  not  effaced  Pestalozzi  from  men's 
memories.  In  1871,  Zezchwitz  acclaimed  him  as 
"  the  hope  of  the  German  people  in  evil  days."  In 
1873,  Wiesinger  discoursed  on  the  part  due  to  him 
in  the  renovation  of  the  German  people.  Finally, 
in  1885,  Wienner  published  a  manual  of  pedagogy 
on  Pestalozzi's  principles. 

The  importance  attached  by  educational  theorists 
to  the  work  of  the  humble  teacher  of  the  people 
is  proved  by  a  whole  series  of  books.  In  these  he 
has  been  in  turn  compared  with  the  most  celebrated 
of  modern  educators.  The  Pere  Girard  said,  "  His- 
tory will  one  day  draw  a  parallel  between  the  two 
Swiss  pedagogues,  Rousseau  and  Pestalozzi."  His- 

1  It  is  to  be  regretted  that  Rapet 's  monograph  has  not  been 
printed.  His  work  is  superior  to  that  by  Pompee,  who  shared 
the  prize  with  him.  The  Academy  gave  £120  to  Rapet  and  £80  to 
Pompe'e.  Rapet  informs  us,  in  his  unpublished  notes,  that  there 
was  a  thought  of  awarding  the  entire  prize  to  him.  But  this  was 
in  1848,  and  Giraud,  the  correspondent,  gave  him  to  understand 
that  £200  would  have  seemed  "too  aristocratic  a  reward." 


116  PESTALOZZI 

tory  has  not  failed  to  do  so.  How  often  the  Stans 
teacher  has  been  compared  with  the  author  of 
Emile  in  pamphlets  and  in  large  volumes.1  There 
is  hardly  an  illustrious  pedagogue  to  whom  he 
has  not  been  likened.  Here  we  have  a  little  book 
entitled,  Comenius  and  Pestalozzij  considered  as 
Founders  of  the  Popular  School; 2  another  in  which 
Pestalozzi's  principles  are  compared  with  FroebePs ; 3 
a  third,  in  which  the  resemblances  between  Pesta- 
lozzi  and  Diesterweg  are  examined ; 4  others  again, 
in  which  the  relations  of  Pestalozzi's  method  with 
Francke's,5  Fellenberg's,6  and  Herbart's  7  are  studied. 
But  it  is  not  alone  the  study  of  Pestalozzi's  gen- 
eral theories  which  has  continued  to  preoccupy 
the  friends  of  education.  Practical  workers  have 
not  ceased  to  look  to  him  for  directions  concerning 
the  various  divisions  of  primary  education.  Let 
us  mention,  for  example,  Exercices  et  travaux  pour 
les  enfants,  selon  la  methode  et  les  precedes  de  Pesta- 
lozzi  et  de  Froebel,  published  in  1873  by  Madame  and 

1  H6risson,  Pestalozzi,  eleve  de  Rousseau,  Paris,  1886;  Hunziker, 
Pestalozzi  und  Rousseau,  Bale,  1885;  Schneider,  Rousseau  und  Pesta- 
lozzij Bromberg,  1866;  Zoller,  Pestalozzi  und  Rousseau,  Frankfort. 

2  Hoffmeister,    Comenius    und    Pestalozzi    als    Begrunder    der 
Volksschule,  Berlin,  1877. 

3  Fr.    Beust,  Die  Grundgedanken  von  Pestalozzi   und  Froebel, 
Zurich,  1881.     4  Balster,  Dortmund,  1846.     6  Kramer,  Berlin,  1854. 

8  Hunziker,  Langensalza,  1879. 

7  A.  Vogel,  Herbart  oder  Pestalozzi?     Hanover,  1887. 


PESTALOZZI  117 

M.  Charles  Delon;  several  manuals  of  elementary 
arithmetic,  a  small  work  by  H.  Ruppert,  On  the 
Application  of  Pestalozzi's  Method  to  the  Teaching 
of  Mathematics,  which  appeared  at  Langensalza, 
in  1879 ;  a  treatise  by  the  Englishman,  Tate,  which, 
since  1850,  has  passed  through  several  editions,  under 
the  title  of  First  Principles  of  Arithmetic  based  on 
Pestalozzi's  Principles;  and  again,  The  First  Year 
of  Pestalozzian  Arithmetic,  published  by  Hoose, 
the  American,  in  1882.  Let  us  finally  mention,  from 
a  more  general  point  of  view,  the  Cahiers  de  peda- 
gogie  d'apres  les  principes  de  Pestalozzi,  compiled 
in  1879  by  the  Swiss  pedagogue  Paroz. 

Our  list  is  by  no  means  complete.1  If  it  be  true, 
as  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer  said,  that  the  Pestalozzian 
idea  is  yet  to  be  realized,  it  is  not  the  fault  of  the 
innumerable  commentators  who  have  attempted 
to  develop  it.  We  cannot  call  to  mind  a  thinker 
who  has  traced  so  deep  a  furrow  in  the  conscious- 
ness of  humanity.  But  whatever  the  interest  of 
the  publications  which  his  memory  has  called  forth, 
it  is  to  himself  that  we  must  return,  if  we  wish  really 
to  know  him ;  it  is  in  his  own  writings,  his  actions, 
and  the  virtues  of  his  character  that  we  must  seek 
the  causes  of  our  admiration  for  him,  his  democratic 
mind  and  his  popular  soul. 

1  See  also  Pestalozzi  und  Luther,  by  Schlimpret,  1864. 


VIII 

CERTAINLY  we  must  not  expect  to  find  models  of 
literary  elegance,  or  studied  composition,  or  even 
connected  and  concise  reasoning  in  Pestalozzi's 
numerous  writings.  His  thought  is  confused,  dis- 
connected, and  obscure;  his  style  often  strange. 
Incapable  of  governing  men,  he  was  no  less  unable 
to  control  his  ideas  and  to  master  the  tumultuous 
flood  of  his  fancies.  Vivid  but  disordered  con- 
ceptions whirled  through  his  brain.  Nothing  could 
be  more  incoherent,  for  example,  than  the  com- 
position of  his  Lettres  a  Gessner,  and  yet  these  form 
the  best  of  his  works.  Sentimental  effusions  of  an 
overflowing  heart,  apostrophe  and  invocation  in 
prophetic  and  declamatory  language,  incessantly 
sever  and  break  the  irresolute  thread  of  reasoning. 
One  feels  that  the  author  is  growing  weary  and  that 
he  finds  it  difficult  to  follow  up  the  theoretical  dis- 
cussion on  which  he  has  embarked.  His  imagina- 
tion is  continually  breaking  loose  and  wandering. 
At  every  moment  he  is  obliged  to  leave  the  long 
digressions  in  which  he  strays:  "I  resume  my 

118 


PESTALOZZI  119 

explanation;  ...  I  return  to  my  subject."  Com- 
parisons and  figures  of  speech  abound  and  over- 
whelm the  thought  with  the  whimsicality  of  their 
confused  fancies.  Thus,  in  the  space  of  a  few  pages, 
he  likens  himself,  in  turn,  "to  a  sailor  who  has  lost 
his  harpoon  and  attempts  to  catch  whales  with  a 
hook/7  when  he  wishes  to  express  the  disproportion 
between  his  means  and  his  object;  "to  a  straw 
which  would  not  provide  hold  for  a  cat/7  to  proclaim 
his  lack  of  importance;  to  an  owl,  to  portray  his 
isolation;  to  a  reed,  to  illustrate  his  weakness; 
to  a  mouse  afraid  of  the  cat,  to  describe  his  timidity. 
From  all  this  confusion  and  verbal  chaos,  however, 
flashes  of  sincere,  true  eloquence  shine  forth  at  times. 
If  Pestalozzi  is  defective  in  the  abstract  presenta- 
tion of  general  ideas,  he  makes  up  for  it  nobly  in 
his  imaginative  works.  In  them  he  shows  himself 
a  clever  narrator  and  an  exquisite  painter  of  manners. 
With  Leonard  et  Gertrude  he  inaugurated  the  popular 
novel ;  he  created  a  style  which  has  not  found  suffi- 
ciqnt  imitators,  and  of  which  he  himself  could  not 
follow  the  inspiration  in  Christophe  et  Else,  another 
of  his  works,  which  is  nothing  but  a  wearisome  and 
ultra-didactic  commentary  to  Leonard  et  Gertrude. 
But  in  his  " first  book  for  the  people/'  in  the  innocent 
simple  pictures  which  he  traced  of  village  life,  there 
are  really  exquisite  pages.  No  surprise  is  felt  at 


120  PESTALOZZI 

learning  from  Madame  de  Stael  that  she  shed  tears  at 
certain  passages,  —  when  reading,  for  example,  the 
touching  scene  in  which  the  old  dying  grandmother 
obtains  from  her  grandson  the  restoration  of  some 
potatoes  which  he  had  stolen.  This  beautiful  book, 
which  has  been  lost  sight  of  too  much,  is  also  recom- 
mended by  the  portraiture  and  character  analysis 
which  it  contains. 

In  it  Pestalozzi  displayed  great  subtlety  of  obser- 
vation. Nothing  could  be  more  delicately  studied 
and  described  than  the  moral  physiognomies  of  the 
seven  children  of  Gertrude,  the  perfect  mother, 
whose  sons  and  daughters  have  all  the  failings  com- 
mon to  their  age.  Although  the  plot  of  the  novel 
is  not  in  itself  intricate,  it  is  blended  with  amus- 
ing anecdotes,  comic  episodes,  and  touching  scenes 
which  save  it  from  being  devoid  of  interest.  The 
eternal  struggle  between  good  and  evil  is  there  set 
out :  the  representatives  of  good  are  honest  labourers 
whom  the  announcement  of  a  few  days'  unhoped-for 
work  is  sufficient  to  delight,  a  simple,  good  pastor, 
and  a  generous,  kindly  lord ;  whilst  evil  is  incarnated 
in  an  unjust  bailiff,  who  is  at  the  same  time  a  none 
too  scrupulous  publican.  "I  have  long  thought," 
said  Pestalozzi,  —  who  would  perhaps  have  occasion 
to  repeat  his  words  if  he  lived  at  the  present  day,  — 
"that  a  bailiff  or  mayor  should  not  be  a  publican 


PESTALOZZI  121 

by  trade.  .  .  ."  Directed  especially  against  the 
public  house  and  drunkenness,  the  novel  of  Leonard 
et  Gertrude  has  a  high  moral  value,  the  importance 
of  which  has  not  diminished  with  time.  The  three 
last  parts,  although  they  do  not  offer  the  same 
dramatic  attraction  as  the  first,  deserve,  nevertheless, 
to  be  preserved  from  oblivion;  for,  in  telling  the 
story  of  the  regeneration  of  a  village,  they  present, 
as  it  were,  an  advance  scheme  of  all  the  economic 
and  moral  reforms  which  have  transformed  the 
condition  of  the  rural  populations  of  Switzerland 
in  the  course  of  a  century's  constant  progress. 
Sensibility  and  imagination,  beyond  all  doubt, 
play  the  most  prominent  part  in  the  majority  of 
Pestalozzi's  writings.  But  a  ready  wit  is  also  ap- 
parent in  them.  A  teacher  of  Berne,  with  whom 
I  recently  had  the  pleasure  of  conversing,  whilst 
pointing  out  to  me  the  pointed  nose  and  thin  lips 
in  a  portrait  of  Pestalozzi,  said:  "Do  you  see? 
Pestalozzi  possessed  the  ironical  faculty.  .  .  ." 
An  unexpected  criticism,  which,  however,  contains 
a  certain  amount  of  truth.  Was  not  Socrates,  a 
believer  and  an  enthusiast,  the  father  of  irony? 
In  the  same  way,  Pestalozzi,  sentimental  as  he  may 
have  been,  was  not  wanting,  at  times,  either  in  deli- 
cate sarcasm  or  biting  raillery.  Take  the  Manuel 
des  Meres  itself,  that  elementary,  infantile  book: 


122  PESTALOZZI 

you  will  find  in  it  a  number  of  pungent  observations, 
which  would  not  be  amiss  in  the  work  of  a  moralist. 
"  Lawyers  talk  a  great  deal,  especially  when  they 
are  pleading  a  bad  case.'7  —  "Many  women  who 
examined  nothing  but  their  mirror  in  their  youth, 
prefer  to  examine  their  cash-box  once  they  are  mar- 
ried.'7 —  "Men  and  women  speak  the  more  as  they 
think  the  less.  .  .  ."  The  impress  of  Pestalozzi's 
satirical  vein  is  to  be  found  more  especially  in  his 
Fables,  in  which  he  brings  before  us  lords  and 
peasants,  as  well  as  animals  and  plants. 

Do  not  let  us  take  him  for  a  scholar,  with  a  re- 
stricted, narrow  mind,  confining  himself  to  ques- 
tions of  method  and  pedagogical  procedure.  His 
thought  often  rises  above  the  school  and  class  room. 
We  must  not  regard  as  wholly  unworthy  of  atten- 
tion the  reflections  contained  in  his  philosophical 
book,  Recherches  sur  la  marche  de  la  nature,  which, 
of  all  his  writings,  as  has  already  been  said,  gave 
him  most  trouble,  —  he  was  at  work  on  it  for  three 
years,  —  and  of  which  the  lack  of  success  grieved 
him  deeply.  In  it  he  distinguishes  three  elements 
in  the  human  being :  animal  man,  social  man,  and, 
lastly,  moral  man,  which  is  the  work  of  individual- 
ism and  will.  In  it  he  expresses  himself  strongly 
on  the  rights  of  property.  The  origin  of  property, 
says  he,  whether  legitimate  or  otherwise,  should 


PESTALOZZI  123 

not  weigh  with  us.  Property  is  sacred,  since  it 
exists.  We  ought  to  respect  it  because  we  form 
a  society.  But,  on  the  other  hand,  Pestalozzi  com- 
plains that  property-holders  do  not  fulfil  all  their 
duties.  In  their  selfishness  they  forget  the  unfor- 
tunate and  the  poor,  who,  having  the  same  natural 
right  to  property,  yet  do  not  share  in  it ;  they  forget 
them,  excepting  when  they  require  them  to  undergo 
military  service  or  to  pay  taxes. 

Pestalozzi's  thought  was  generally  governed  by 
wisdom  and  good  sense,  but  at  times  he  used  the 
language  of  utopianism.  For  example,  he  attacked 
printing,  cursing  it  as  the  cause  of  all  the  evils  from 
which  society  is  suffering.  It  has  turned  away  the 
eyes  of  man  —  the  eyes,  which  are  the  principal  in- 
strument of  knowledge,  —  from  the  instructive  and 
fertile  spectacle  of  the  actual  universe,  to  fix 
and  hold  them  on  the  dead  letters  of  loquacious 
and  barren  books.  He  also  attacked  the  Protestant 
Reformation,  because  it  allowed  ignorance  and 
stupidity  to  speak  on  questions  of  theology  which 
the  human  mind  will  never  solve. 

Penetratioi^  was  not  lacking  in  Pestalozzi.  Lively 
as  was  his  sympathy  with  the  French  Revolution, 
he  could  recognize  its  faults,  condemn  its  excesses, 
and  foresee  its  consequences.  "Either,"  said  he, 
"it  will  respect  the  liberty  and  rights  of  all  citizens, 


124  PESTALOZZI 

or  else  it  will  come  about  that  the  opposing  minority, 
richer  and  craftier,  will  soon  succeed  in  once  more 
subjugating  an  imprudent  and  disordered  majority, 
which  those  formerly  in  power  persist  in  regarding 
as  a  band  of  escaped  slaves/'  Rousseau  had  fore- 
told the  Revolution  thirty  years  in  advance:  as 
early  as  1793,  Pestalozzi'  was  prophesying  the  re- 
newal of  hostilities  by  the  old  regime,  the  Empire,  and 
also  the  Restoration. 

An  ardent,  burning  eloquence  often  directed 
Pestalozzi's  pen,  and  a  touch  of  poetry  was  added. 
He  spoke  of  his  misfortunes  and  his  painful  destiny 
with  as  much  pathos  as  the  author  of  the  Confes- 
sions, when  recounting  the  trials  of  his  life.  But 
it  is  especially  when  he  deals  with  education  and 
the  interests  of  humanity  that  his  solemnly  implor- 
ing voice  becomes  animated  and  excited.  "We 
have/7  cried  he,  " schools  for  reading,  writing,  and 
catechism;  but  we  have  not  the  essential,  schools 
for  forming  men.  .  .  .  Modern  civilization  resem- 
bles the  colossus  of  which  the  prophet  speaks. 
Its  head  of  gold ;  that  is,  the  arts,  in  which  it  excels ; 
it  touches  the  clouds.  But  popular  instruction, 
which  ought  to  be  the  basis  and  support  of  this 
magnificent  head,  is  like  the  feet  of  the  statue, 
it  is  made  of  the  coarsest  and  most  fragile 
clay.  .  .  .  The  people  of  Europe  are  unhappy 


PESTALOZZI  125 

and    orphaned:    let    us    give    them   at    least    a 
mother!  .  .  ." 

The  writer,  in  Pestalozzi,  is  confused  and  incom-/ 
plete ;  numerous  defects  spoil  the  qualities.  But  the 
man  is  beyond  compare  and  is  almost  entirely  made 
up  of  virtues.  I  am  not  speaking  only  of  the  purity 
of  his  morals,  nor  of  his  devotion  and  abnegation, 
nor  of  his  activity  which  scarcely  knew  repose,  nor 
of  his  courage:  the  Zurich  schoolboy,  laughed  at 
by  his  comrades,  was,  nevertheless,  the  only  one 
who,  one  day  of  panic,  when  the  rumblings  of  an 
earthquake  shook  the  walls  of  the  school  and  the 
occupants  of  the  class  rooms  fled  in  fear,  ventured 
to  go  back  into  the  building  and  quietly  remove 
his  books.  But  what  examples  he  has  left,  more 
especially,  of  active,  superhuman  charity,  pushed 
to  excess,  as  at  Neuhof  and  Stans.  He  it  was  who, 
accosted  by  a  beggar,  and  not  having  a  halfpenny 
in  his  pocket,  made  him  a  present  of  the  silver  buckles 
of  his  shoes,  and  returned  to  Zurich  with  his  foot- 
wear gaping,  badly  fastened  with  straw.  He  it  was 
who,  bringing  away  from  a  friend's  house  some 
money,  which,  in  a  moment  of  distress,  he  had  gone 
to  borrow,  met  on  the  way  a  poor  peasant  who  was 
lamenting  the  loss  of  a  cow,  and  he  despoiled  himself 
for  the  man's  benefit.  .  .  .  Only  once  was  Pesta- 
lozzi  rich,  and  even  then  it  was  merely  anticipation. 


126  PESTALOZZI 

When  Gotta,  the  publisher,  opened  a  subscription 
for  the  publication  of  his  complete  works,  it  met 
with  great  success.  Kings  and  philosophers  has- 
tened to  bring  their  offering:  so  that  Cotta  could 
undertake  to  pay  Pestalozzi  about  £2000  for  his 
rights  as  author.  But  this  wealth  —  expected 
rather  than  realized,  moreover,  for  Cotta  did  not 
fulfil  all  his  engagements  —  was  only  a  fresh  op- 
portunity for  Pestalozzi  to  display  his  admirable 
disinterestedness.  In  one  of  those  speeches  which 
he  loved  to  deliver  in  the  presence  of  his  assembled 
household,1  on  the  12th  of  January,  1818,  he  declared 
that  he  intended  the  money  which  was  promised 
him  to  go  to  various  scholastic  foundations,  to  a 
normal  school  for  men  and  women  teachers,  to  one 
or  more  elementary  schools,  and,  lastly,  to  the 
continued  improvement  of  all  means  of  instruction 
and  domestic  education  for  the  people.  And  as 
his  grandson,  Gottlieb,  who  had  returned  to  Yver- 
don  a  short  time  before,  was  present  and  listened 
to  this  solemn  donation  which  robbed  him  of  the 
most  definite  portion  of  his  inheritance,  Pestalozzi, 
turning  to  him,  said:  "You  returned  into  our  midst 
and  said  to  me:  ' Father,  I  want  to  be  what  you 
are.  .  .  .'  These  words  made  me  happy.  Neither 

1  It  was  from  1808  to  1818  that  Pestalozzi  formed  the  habit  of 
delivering  every  year,  in  solemn  gatherings,  Discours  a  so,  maison. 


PESTALOZZI  127 

gold  nor  silver  can  make  you  what  I  am.  .  .  .    My 
heart  alone  made  me  what  I  am.  ..." 

The  unhappy  great  man  inspires  in  those  who 
study  him  closely  an  admiration  mingled  with 
compassion.  The  material  security  of  existence 
was  often  deniedjnn^  no  money 

for  the  purchase  of  paper  to  compose  his  immortal 
books,  and  he  wrote  Leonard  et  Gertrude  on  theJl 
margins  of  an  old  account  hoo^  In  order  to  live,1 1 
he  was  reduced  to  selling  the  medals  awarded  him  i 
by  the  philanthropic  societies  of  Switzerland.    He 

** s-  •    '  "  ~~ —    •»- 

walked  "like  a  somnambulist  in  the  world  of  bu£i- 
ness.  .  7""."  If  one  penetrates  into  his  private  life, 
itlslmpossible  not  to  be  touched  by  all  that  he  had 
to  suffer  from  his  associates,  and  even  from  his 
family.  Assuredly  he  could  not  have  dispensed 
with  his  collaborators,  who,  by  their  acquirements, 
remedied  the  gaps  in  his  education;  he  spelled  badly  1 1 
and  was  not  sure  of  himself  in  the  four  rules ;  with 
justice  could  he  say,  "  If  Buss,  Krusi,  and  Tobler 
had  not  come  to  my  assistance,  my  theories  would 
have  been  quenched  in  my  heart,  like  the  stifled 
flames  of  a  seething  volcano  which  cannot  find  a 
vent.  .  .  ."  And  yet  what  disillusions,  what  mor- 
tification and  bitterness,  came  to  him  from  his  asso- 
ciates, whose  slave  he  became,  who  were  his  tyrants, 
and  grieved  him  by  their  hatred?  "We  founded 


128  PESTALOZZI 

this  house  on  love,  and  love  has  disappeared  from 
our  midst !  .  .  ."  At  times  he  rose  in  revolt  and 
used  hard  words  to  describe  masters  whom  yet  he 
loved:  "Jullien  is  a  superficial  Frenchman;  Krusi 
is  a  lazy  dog;  Schmid  behaves  like  a  wild  ass.  .  .  ." 
Did  he  at  least  find  in  his  life's  companion  a  com- 
plete consolation  for  his  sorrows,  his  afflictions,  and  the 
loss  of  his  only  son  ?  It  is  to  be  doubted.  Madame 
Pestalozzi  was  doubtless  a  devoted  and  generous 
wife,  ready  to  sacrifice  her  patrimony  to  meet  the 
expenses  of  her  husband's  hazardous  undertakings. 
But  she  does  not  appear  always  to  have  sustained 
him  with  her  confidence  and  surrounded  him  with 
her  care.  During  the  toilsome  years  of  the  Neuhof 
enterprise  she  absented  herself  frequently,  visiting 
her  friends'  mansions,  staying  there  several  months 
at  a  stretch,  and  leaving  the  unhappy  man  to  strug- 
gle alone  in  the  midst  of  difficulties  of  every  kind. 
After  the  troubles  and  failure  of  Neuhof,  she  be- 
came uneasy  and  distrustful,  reasonably  so  we 
must  confess.  A  few  words  written  by  Pestalozzi 
to  her,  from  Stans,  in  1798,  throw  much  light  on 
this  point:  ".  .  .  If  I  am  worth  what  I  think,  you 
may  rely  on  receiving  help  and  support  from  me 
before  long.  But  in  the  meantime,  be  quiet.  .  .  . 
Each  of  your  words  lacerates  my  heart.  I  cannot 
endure  your  eternal  incredulity.  You  have  waited 


PESTALOZZI  129 

thirty  years:  wait  another  three  months!  .  .  ." 
At  Yverdon,  Madame  Pestalozzi  lived  apart  in  a 
corner  of  the  castle,  hardly  joining  in  the  life  of  the 
institution  and  her  husband's  activity,  dreading  the 
noise  and  agitation.  Ramsauer,  who  was  decidedly 
the  scandal-monger  among  the  Pestalozzians,  nar- 
rated some  details  which  reveal  singular  peculiari- 
ties in  the  relations  of  husband  and  wife.  Pesta- 
lozzi only  sat  at  his  wife's  table  when  expressly 
invited  by  her.  Ordinarily  he  shared  his  pupils7 
meals.  To  make  up  for  this  he  was  expected  to 
play  cards  with  her  every  evening.  They  could 
not  remain  together  for  ten  minutes  without  quar- 
relling. And  yet  it  was  affirmed  that  they  loved 
each  other  tenderly.  When  Madame  Pestalozzi  died, 
on  the  llth  of  December,  1818,  the  survivor  was 
deeply  afflicted.  Let  us,  however,  note  these  reflec- 
tions of  a  woman  friend  of  theirs  who  wrote  some 
days  before  Madame  Pestalozzi's  death :  "  There  are 
in  them  two  distinct  souls.  In  her  will  die  a  be- 
loved wife  and  worthy  companion,  but  not  a  part  of 
Pestalozzi's  ego" 

In  the  isolation  of  his  last  years,  struggling  with 
a  thousand  cares  and  in  financial  embarrassment, 
Pestalozzi  suffered  still  more.  Let  us  not  pity  him 
too  much,  in  spite  of  all.  In  the  consciousness  of  his 
duty  done  and  the  joy  of  his  partly  executed  work,  he 


130 


PESTALOZZI 


more  than  once  enjoyed  heart-felt  peace,  what  he 
himself  called  " paradise  upon  earth/'  He  knew 
the  grandeur  of  his  design,  and  he  found  a  few  hours' 
happiness  by  devoting  his  entire  life  to  the  happi- 
ness of  others. 

He  dreamed  morethan  he  accomplished,  and  sowed 
lorethan  he  harvested  We  are  told  that/3uring 
his Twal£s7  he  gathered  stones  and  minerals  by  the 
handful,  filling  his  handkerchief  and  cramming  his 
pockets  with  them;  then,  when  this  unmethodical 
collector  returned  home,  he  put  them  haphazard 
in  a  corner,  and  never  found  time  to  classify  and 
catalogue  them.  This  in  some  degree  represents 
what  he  was  in  his  intellectual  life,  heaping  up  ob- 
servations and  accumulating  experience,  without 
ever  succeeding  in  organizing  a  body  of  doctrine. 
The  nobility  of  his  aspirationsjind  the  beauty  of  his 
aim,jn^^  execution,  the^effoFt  rather 

than_the  jgsult,  was  what^cimracterizecnESrTand 
constituted  his  worth.  As^s  very  justty~S3ld"  by 
Mr.  Herbert  Spencer,  who  of  all  his  forerunners  in 
educational  matters  mentions  Pestalozzi  alone,  in 
his  book  on  Education,  ^Pestalozzi's  mind  was  one  of 
partial  intuitions.^  As  he  himself  admitted,  "I  did 
not  know  what  I  was  doing;  I  only  knew  what 
I  desired.  .  .  ."  He  desired  humanity  to  be  en- 
nobled through  instruction.  "The  only  way  of 


PESTALOZZI  131 

putting  an  end  to  the  social  disorder,  the  fermenta- 
tions and  popular  revolutions,  as  well  as  to  the  abuses 
of  despotism  both  of  princes  and  of  the  multitude, 
is  to  ennoble  man."  Ttle  was  sustained  by  an  ardent 
faith  in  the  natural  forces  of  humanity  and  the  power 
of  education,  but  his  optimism  was  not  absolute. 
Rarely,  said  he,  is  man  good.  \  He  added,  however, 
that  this  was  the  fault  of  his  bad  instruction,  as 
man  only  becomes  man  by  instruction.  And  like 
Rousseau,  beyond  the  misery  and  vice  of  existing 
society,  he  hailed  the  coming  of  a  good  and  happy 
humanity,  restored  to  itself  by  the  effect  of  a  uni- 
versal education  conforming  to  the  laws  of  nature. 
"I  believe,"  said  he,  "in  the  human  heart,  and  in 
that  belief  I  walk  on  ploughed-up  ground  as  I  would 
walk  on  the  firm  paving  of  a  Roman  road." 

To  estimate  equitably  a  man's  merit  and  the  value 
of  a  work,  it  is  necessary  to  restore  the  setting,  the 
environment  in  which  the  man  lived  and  in  which 
the  work  was  attempted.  To  judge  of  the  impor- 
tance of  Rousseau's  attempts,  let  us  make  allowance 
for  the  wretched  state  of  education  in  his  time. 
"  Despite  the  fine  appearance  of  civilization,  so 
much  vaunted,  nine  men  out  of  ten  are  dispossessed 
of  the  right  belonging  to  every  man  living  in  society, 
—  the  right  of  education."  Knowledge,  still  a  privi- 
lege of  the  richer  classes,  does  not  enlighten  the 


132  PESTALOZZI 

poorer  classes.  "  The  more  I  observe  the  people,  the 
more  I  am  certain  that  the  broad  stream  of  education, 
which  in  books  seems  to  flow  for  them,  evaporates 
in  the  village  and  the  school  into  a  dark,  damp  mist." 
After  a  hundred  years  of  progress,  it  is  easy  to 
deride  the  insufficiency  and  poverty  of  Pestalozzi's 
plan  of  instruction.  If  we  would  be  just,  let  us  think 
what  primary  studies  were  in  Switzerland  at  that 
time,  "  on  what  a  quicksand  the  cankered  schools 
were  built/ '  with  what  pupils,  and  also  with  what 
teachers,  Pestalozzi  had  to  deal.  Let  us  recall  how 
Krusi,  his  first  collaborator,  became  a  teacher. 
Krusi  was  eighteen  years  old  in  1793.  He  was  a 
hawker  by  trade.  One  day,  on  the  highway,  he 
met  a  functionary  who  said  to  him  point-blank: 
" Wouldn't  you  like  to  be  a  teacher?  There  is  a 
situation  vacant  in  the  school  at  Gais." —  "But  I 
know  nothing/7  replied  Krusi,  naively.  .  .  .  His 
interlocutor  was  not  discouraged.  "You  will  easily 
learn  what  a  teacher  can  and  should  know  in  our 
schools."  Krusi  made  up  his  mind,  and  sat  for  the 
regulation  examination.  "There  were  two  of  us 
competing,"  he  narrated.  "The  principal  test  con- 
sisted in  writing  the  Lord's  prayer.  I  set  about  it 
as  best  I  could.  I  had  noticed  the  use  of  capital 
letters  in  German  writing  and  distributed  them 
liberally,  even  in  the  middle  of  words.  When  the 


PESTALOZZI  133 

examination  was  over,  Captain  Schoefer,  who 
decided  the  contest,  told  me  that  my  competitor 
read  better  than  I  did,  but  that  my  writing  was 
better,  in  short,  that  I  was  successful.  .  .  .  How  can 
we  help  being  indulgent  towards  teachers  recruited 
from  the  highways  and  scarcely  able  to  read  and 
write?  .  .  .  How  avoid  indulgence  also  towards 
the  educator  who,  for  the  accomplishment  of  his 
great  schemes,  had  as  auxiliaries  only  masters  barely 
reclaimed  from  rusticity,  who  had  themselves  to 
be  instructed  and  formed  before  they  could  in  their 
turn  form  the  pupils  confided  to  their  care  ?  Pesta- 
lozzi  was  not  wrong  when  he  said,  "The  teaching 
actually  in  use  seemed  to  me  an  immense  swamp, 
which  I  crossed  by  resolutely  plunging  into  the  mire." 
Everything  then  remained  to  be  done  in  order  to 
institute  the  elementary  school,  the  people's  school, 
the  modern  school,  such  as  a  hundred  years  of  effort 
have  hardly  succeeded  in  organizing  in  civilized 
countries.  Pestalozzi  sketched  out  the  work,  and 
those  who  have  continued  it  cannot  forget  what  they 
owe  to  the  heroic  impulse  given  by  him.  He  con- 
ceived the  universal  school,  open  to  all  children,  and, 
distinct  from  the  church.  Pestalozzi  was  the  first, 
in  order  of  date,  of  the  lay  teachers.  In  the  last 
parts  of  Leonard  et  Gertrude,  he  boldly  subordinate^ 
the  pastor  to  the  schoolmaster.  And  he  gives  ag 


134  PESTALOZZI 

his  reason  that  laymen  alone  are  in  a  position  to 
prepare  men  for  family  and  social  life.  Summariz- 
ing a  conversation  between  a  clergyman  and  a  teacher, 
he  concluded  in  these  terms :  "Thus  the  man,  whose 
power  came  from  his  knowledge  of  the  world,  spoke 
to  the  priest  whose  weakness  was  due  to  his  lack  of 
such  knowledge." 

Poor,  strange,  great  man,  at  once  puerile  and 
sublime,  awkward  in  his  manners  and  gestures,  but 
admirable  in  his  intentions  and  actions !  His  con- 
temporaries ridiculed  and  derided  him  at  times. 
At  Zurich,  his  school-fellows  called  him  a  "queer 
chap'7;  his  neighbours  at  Neuhof  described  him  as 
a  "crank";  his  friends  themselves,  grieved  at  his 
lack  of  practical  ability,  said  that  he  would  die  in 
a  poorhouse  or  a  lunatic  asylum.  But  insult, 
derision,  misadventure,  and  adversity,  all  glanced 
aside  from  his  intrepid  mind,  without  cooling  its 
ardour  or  disturbing  its  valiant  serenity.  He  went 
on  to  the  end,  smiling  at  privations,  asking  only 
to  live  under  a  thatched  roof,  there  to  pursue 
his  dream,  insensible  to  reverses,  indomitable  and 
patient.  At  the  same  time  he  was  modest,  recog- 
nizing that  he  was  only  seeking  to  put  into  practice 
"what  good  sense  had  taught  men  for  thousands  of 
years/7  and  not  hiding  from  himself  the  imperfec- 
tions of  his  unfinished  work.  "Examine/7  said  he, 


PESTALOZZI  135 

in  the  Schwanengesangj  his  pedagogic  testament,  — 
"  examine  everything  in  what  I  have  proposed,  and 
retain  what  is  good.  If  some  better  conception  has 
ripened  in  your  minds,  add  it  to  what  I  have  striven 
to  offer  you  in  a  spirit  of  truth  and  love;  but,  I 
pray  you,  do  not  reject  the  whole  work,  in  its  en- 
tirety and  without  examination,  as  though  it  were 
a  chimera  condemned  beforehand.  .  .  ." 

No,  his  aim  was  not  chimerical.  If  he  did  not 
reach  it,  he  showed  his  successors  the  road  by  which 
it  could  be  reached.  He  did  not  forget  himself  in 
vain  reveries.  Rousseau,  with  his  visionary  hu- 
manitarianism  and  his  platonic  outbursts,  seems 
small  beside  this  active  philanthropist,  who  did  not 
rest  content  with  writing,  but  acted  and  made  his 
acts  conform  to  his  thoughts.  Let  him  not  be  se- 
verely judged  because  he  could  not  define  his  method 
with  exactitude.  He  himself  was  the  method,  with 
his  animation  and  his  indefatigable  enthusiasm. 
He  remains  "a  unique  man/7  as  his  friend  Lavater 
said.  His  life  was  not  wasted,  if  only  on  account 
of  the  examples  which  it  has  left  us;  and  not  in 
vain  did  his  heart  beat  for  the  same  idea  during 
sixty  years.  If  what  Raumer  called  "his  all-power- 
ful love"  could,  whilst  he  was  alive,  conquer  all 
who  approached  him,  his  sentiments  can  still  com- 
municate themselves  from  afar  to  men's  minds,  give 


136  PESTALOZZI 

rise  to  noble  emulation,  and  beget  fine  teaching 
careers.  In  any  case,  whatever  its  deficiencies, 
his  work  remains  the  product  of  a  reason,  superior 
at  times,  always  and  everywhere  waited  on  by 
infinite  tenderness. 

Queen  Louise  of  Prussia,  in  transports  of  admira- 
tion for  Pestalozzi,  said  of  him:  "How  that  man 
loves  humanity!  ...  I  thank  him  in  humanity's 
name.'7  All  posterity  should  associate  itself  with 
this  grateful  homage,  and  thank  him,  in  the  name 
of  that  ignorant  humanity  which  he  wished  to  edu- 
cate and  in  the  name  of  that  poor,  suffering  human- 
ity which  he  wished  to  raise  and  succour,  by  teaching 
it  industrial  work,  thrift,  and  honesty. 

One  day,  Pestalozzi,  looking  out  upon  the  pictu- 
resque scenery  of  the  mountains  and  valleys  of  his 
native  land,  exclaimed,  "Yes,  nature  is  beautiful/7 
—  and  where  could  this  be  said  with  greater  truth 
than  in  Switzerland,  that  country  on  which  nature 
has  lavished  her  marvels,  and  has  given  to  the  Alps 
lakes  which  bathe  their  feet,  like  so  many  mirrors 
in  which  to  reflect  and  multiply  their  beauties,  — 
"yes,  nature  is  beautiful,  but  there  is  something 
more  beautiful  than  nature  and  her  earthly  splen- 
dours, and  that  is  the  human  heart.77 

Yes,  we  say,  when  it  is  the  heart  of  a  Pestalozzi. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

ONLY  the  principal  authorities  are  mentioned  here,  the  works 
which  have  been  indicated  at  the  foot  of  the  pages  being  omitted. 

In  the  case  of  Pestalozzi 's  own  works,  reference  is  made  to 
the  complete  editions  only. 

Edition  Gotta,  Sdmmtliche  Schriften,  Stuttgart  and  Tubingen, 
1819-1826, 15  vols.,  8vo.  —  Edition  Seyffarth,  Sdmmtliche  Werke, 
Brandenburg,  1869-1872,  18  vols.,  12vo ;  a  new  edition,  prepared 
by  M.  SEYFFARTH,  has  been  in  course  of  publication  since  1899. 

There  is  also  a  collection  of  (Euvres  choisies  (Ausgewahlte 
Werke),  by  F.  MANN,  Langensalza,  1869-1870,  4  vols. 

Translations  into  French :  — 

Manuel  des  meres,  translated  from  the  German,  Paris-Geneva, 
1821.  —  Leonard  et  Gertrude,  translated  from  the  German  by  the 
Baroness  de  Guimps  (the  first  part  only),  Paris-Geneva,  1832. — 
Comment  Gertrude  instruit  ses  enfants,  translated  from  the  Ger- 
man by  DR.  E.  DARIN,  Paris,  1882. 

Commentaries  and  biographies  in  French :  — 

M***  DE  H***,  Precis  de  la  nouvelle  methode  df  education  de 
M.  Pestalozzi,  etc.,  Paris,  1804. 

CHAVANNES,  Expose  de  la  methode  elementaire  de  H.  Pes- 
talozzi, suivi  d'une  notice  sur  les  travaux  de  cet  homme  celebret 
son  institut  et  ses  principaux  collaborateurs,  Paris,  1805. 

LE  P.  GIRARD,  Rapport  sur  I'institut  de  M.  Pestalozzi,  a 
Yverdon,  etc.,  Fribourg,  1810. 

JULLIEN  (de  Paris),  Precis  sur  I'institut  d' education  d'Yverdon, 
1  vol.,  8vo,  Milan,  1812;  second  edition,  Paris,  1842,  under 
the  title :  Expose  de  la  methode  d' education  de  Pestalozzi. 

137 


138  BIBLIOGRAPHY 

RAYMOND,  Lettre  sur  I' etdblissement  d'education  d'Yverdon, 
Jonde  et  dirige  par  M.  Pestalozzi,  1814. 

DE  THON  (Mme.  Adele),  Notice  sur  Pestalozzi,  a  pamphlet, 
Geneva,  1827. 

MLLE.  CORNELIE  CHAVANNES,  Biographie  de  H.  Pestalozzi , 
1  vol.,  8vo,  Lausanne,  1853. 

PAROZ,  Pestalozzi ,  sa  vie,  sa  methode  et  ses  principes,  Berne, 
1850. 

ROGER  DE  GUIMPS,  Histoire  de  Pestalozzi,  de  sa  pensee  et  de 
son  oeuvre,  1  vol.,  Lausanne,  1874. 

POMPEE,  tftudes  sur  la  vie  et  les  travaux  pedagogiques  de 
J.  H.  Pestalozzi,  Paris,  1878. 

AUGUSTIN  COCHIN,  Pestalozzi,  etc.,  Paris,  1880. 

L.  VUILLEMIN,  Souvenirs,  Lausanne,  Bridel,  1880. 

J.  GUILLAUME,  Pestalozzi,  tftude  biographique,  Paris,  Hachette, 
1890. 

A.  PINLOCHE,  Pestalozzi  et  r education  populaire  moderne,  Paris, 
Alcan,  1902. 

Refer  also  to  Psychologic  de  I' effort  by  M.  A.  BERTRAND,  at 
the  chapter  on  le  Biranisme  applique  a  I' education,  Paris,  1889; 
in  the  Revue  pedagogique,  to  the  articles  by  M.  MARTIN,  on 
Greaves,  November,  1886;  by  M.  PAULIET,  on  I'Ecole  pestaloz- 
zienne  de  Bergerac,  April,  1890;  in  the  Bibliotheque  universelle 
et  Revue  suisse,  the  article  by  M.  E.  NAVILLE,  Pestalozzi  et  Maine 
de  Biran,  April,  1890.  —  Consult  lastly  Rapet's  manuscripts, 
which  are  preserved  in  the  Musee  pedagogique:  1st,  a  Memoir e 
of  800  pages  presented  to  the  Institute  in  1847 ;  2nd,  a  collection 
of  notes  made  by  Rapet  from  that  date  until  the  last  years  of 
his  life. 

Works  in  German :  — 

The  list  of  German  publications  will  be  found  in  the  bibliog- 
raphy compiled  by  M.  Guillaume  at  the  end  of  his  fine  book,  in 
the  Catalogue  des  ouvrages  du  Musee  pedagogique  of  Paris,  1886- 
1889,  and  in  the  Catalogue  of  the  Pestalozzianum  at  Zurich. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY  139 

We  will  confine  ourselves  to  a  few  references :  — 

RAMSAUER,  Kurze  Skisse  meines  pddagogischen  Lebens,  Olden- 
bourg,  1838. 

BLOCKMANN,  Pestalozzi,  Zuge  aus  dem  Bilde  seines  Lebens, 
etc.,  Leipzig,  1846. 

H.  MORF,  Zur  Biographic  H.  Pestalozzis,  2  parts,  8vo, 
Winterthur,  1865-1866.  —  Pestalozzi  und  seine  Anstalt  in  der 
zweiten  Hdlfte  der  Burgdorfferzeit,  Winterthur,  1885.  —  Einige 
Blatter  aus  Pestalozzis  Lebens  und  Leidens  geschichte,  Langen- 
salza,  1887. 

K.  VON  RAUMER,  Geschichte  der  Padagogik,  etc.,  4  vols.,  8vo, 
Stuttgart,  1846-1854.  The  part  devoted  to  Pestalozzi  has  been 
translated  into  English  by  Tikierd,  London,  1855. 

OTTO  HUNZIKER,  Geschichte  der  schweizerischen  Volksschule, 
3  vols.,  Zurich,  1881-1882,  Vol.  II,  and  various  other  works. 

MORIKOFER,  Die  schweizerische  Liter atury  Leipzig,  1861. 

Works  in  English :  — 

BIBER,  Henry  Pestalozzi  and  his  Plan  of  Education,  etc., 
1  vol.,  8vo,  London,  1831. 

^  HENRY  BARNARD,  Life,  Educational  Principles,  and  Methods 
of  John  Henry  Pestalozzi,  articles  reproduced  from  the  Journal 
of  Education,  1  vol.,  8vo,  New  York,  1859. 

REV.  DR.  MAYO,  Lectures  on  the  Life  of  Pestalozzi,  London, 
1850. 

t-X"  H.  KRUSI,  Pestalozzi,  his  Life,  Work,  and  Influence,  1  vol., 
8vo,  Cincinnati,  New  York,  1875. 

JOSEPH  PAYNE,  Pestalozzi,  the  Influence  of  his  Principles  and 
Practice  on  Elementary  Education,  a  pamphlet  of  20  pages,  Lon- 
don, 1875. 

R.  HEBERT  QUICK,  Educational  Reformers,  New  York,  1893. 

WILLIAM  H.  PAYNE,  Contributions  to  the  Science  of  Educa- 
tion, New  York,  1886  (Chap.  XIV.  The  Teacher  as  a  Philan- 
thropist). 


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